Apologies, but not to Fernando Torres

WEEK 1

I guess I’ll start with a profuse apology to all of my followers—mostly because there’s so many of you (last time I checked I had two)—for taking nearly five months to put up another post. The most recent one—from April 9, 2011—reads: Granada CF: Spanish Soccer’s Story of the Year. El Grana have since been promoted to La Liga—their first season in the top tier in 35 years—following one of the luckier playoff round runs in Spanish history. That’s the good news. The bad news is that Granada currently finds themselves at the bottom of the table due to back-to-back losses to Real Betis, and a 4-0 shellacking by newly rich Malaga just a few hours ago. Fabri Gonzalez’s team remains just one of three squads in La Liga who are goalless. Not exactly story-of-the-year caliber stuff.

No need to despair though. In my experience, teams that play in the city or general area in which I studied abroad slash lived and taught English last year tend to do very well the following season (I did all three in Granada, which is in Spain, and the winner of the Champions League both times was Barcelona…which is also in Spain. There. I proved it. Granada will be fine…gulp).

But let’s have at it, shall we? Here are some quick thoughts from the weekend.

FRONT FIVE

1) Sergio Aguero - Anyone who is still skeptical about how the 23-year-old wiz kid will fare at the Etihad Stadium this year after his £35 million move from Atletico Madrid this summer obviously hasn’t been paying attention to all-things Eastlands. The diminutive striker lit it up again this weekend bagging all three goals for the Citizens in Manchester City’s 3-0 drubbing of Wigan on Saturday, giving him six total for the year. And it’s September. Kun’s performances this season have been nothing short of magical, and I’m extremely proud to say that this young man is almost a year younger than me. Glad I put in all that time to practice after school when I was a kid!

2) Danny Sturridge – It might be a little premature to start talking about goal of the year, and while the 22 year old’s first of the campaign against Sunderland probably won’t win the award, pundits alike will struggle to find a more impressive finish in the Premier League this season. Chelsea won the game 2-1, Sturridge is proving to be a huge bargain, and Fernando Torres still has scored just once since his £50 million transfer from Liverpool last winter. All is well at Stamford Bridge.

3) Franck Ribery – He’ll forgive those of you who just assumed he fell off the face of the Earth last year after enduring a tumultuous, injury-riddled campaign at the Allianz Arena. But the Frenchman was back in a big way this weekend, scoring twice and setting up Mario Gomez for one of his four strikes in Bayern Munich’s 7-0 demolition of Freiberg. Teammate Arjen Robben enjoyed the thumping from the stands, as he is still recovering from a groin injury, but it should be a lot of fun for the rest of the vastly inferior Bundesliga outfits when the dynamic Dutchman returns to an already indomitable Bavarian side.

4) The Agnelli Family – It might come as a shock to all of you, but Agnelli is in fact an Italian name. Juventus’ owners invested a whopping €86 million on new players this summer, and the lavish expenditures paid immediate dividends on Sunday in the club’s 4-1 home victory over Parma. Newcomers Stephen Lichtsteiner, Simone Pepe, and Arturo Vidal all found the back of the net, which injected some life into the Old Lady. Yeah, that’s Juventus’ nickname: the Old Lady.

5) Real Sociedad – I have never made a toast to Royal Society before, but the time do that has never been more appropriate. Playing at home to Barcelona on Saturday, the Basque side that barely escaped relegation last season rallied from a two-goal deficit—following back-to-back strikes in the first eleven minutes, mind you—and somehow managed to even the score at two before time elapsed at the Anoeta. The draw, which has come to be known as the new loss for Barcelona, might turn out to be the only fixture in which Pep Guardiola’s squad actually drops points this year, and if so, I suppose it’s fitting that a Real had a hand in it.

All-Cool -Do

Raul Meireles – If you think I’m more excited about the 28-year-old midfielder’s distributing prowess, you’re dead wrong.

All-Cool Number

99 – Now worn by Lazio’s Djibril Cisse, Milan’s Antonio Cassano, and most recently by Anzhi Makhachkala’s (one of the easier Russian club names to pronounce) pricy new boy, Samuel Eto’o. It’s not the most orthodox of soccer numbers for the back of a shirt, but that’s exactly why these men have chosen it. Or maybe they all just really like Wayne Gretzky, Warren Sapp and restaurant popcorn.

All-Cool Quote

“He's different from Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo because they are strikers and score a lot of goals but I think he's the same as Xavi and Iniesta." – Manchester City manager Roberto Mancini on his talismanic midfielder David Silva.

To be clear though, David Silva is not—and I cannot emphasize this point enough—is NOT the same person as Xavi Hernandez and Andres Iniesta. Xavi is one person. Iniesta another. And David Silva another. Shame on you for thinking they were the same person, Roberto.

All-Cool Headline

Joaquin the Park: Malaga dismantle Granada 4-0 in home opener

Take A Seat, Pal

Fernando Torres – The £50 million man who has scored just one goal in 18 appearances for Chelsea was left on the bench Saturday—shocker—in favor of Danny Sturridge who scored the game-winner; Torres is in the process—a process that may already be done—of losing his job on the Spanish national team to a younger Alvaro Negredo; and now El Nino is being investigated for disparaging comments he allegedly made in a recent interview about his Chelsea teammates, calling some of them “older” and “very slow,” which he blames for his severe scoring drought since joining the club. Torres has denied making the criticisms, asserting that he was mistranslated, but head coach Andre Villas-Boas is still keen on getting to the bottom of everything.

No matter what happens in all of this mess, can all of us just agree that Fernando Torres is already running the risk of becoming one of the biggest flameouts in history—not just in sports; in anything—and that by the time the next transfer window arrives he could find himself plying his trade elsewhere and marked as the single largest walking waste of money the world of soccer has seen (as if that already isn’t the case) since…well…he would be it! These comments have no place or tact, Fernando. We’re sorry you miss Xabi Alonso so much, but with the ever-changing personnel that all soccer teams—at both club and international level—undergo year after year, isn’t the one characteristic inherent in all great soccer players their ability to adapt to new surroundings, to new players?

As a wise man once said: work with what you have, not with what you want. Maybe one day, Torres will come to appreciate that. But for now, to all those Blues officials who are set on investigating Torres’ controversial interview, a little word of advice: “Odio a Chelsea” is Spanish for “I hate Chelsea.”

Granada CF: Spanish Soccer's Story of the Year

It would be difficult for one to argue that there is a more intriguing storyline this year in Spanish soccer than the (inevitable) dogfight between Barcelona and Real Madrid.

It would be even tougher for one to argue this claim with the very likely possibility of the two foes squaring off four times in just 17 days starting April 17th.

I’m going to make the argument anyway.

Granada CF, a club founded in 1931 under the direction of President Julio Lopez Fernandez, is the Spanish soccer story of the year.

Playing this season in the respectable confines of the Segunda Division, the club who originally plied its trade as Recreativo de Granada, has seemingly risen out of the depths of the Iberian abyss and is rapidly approaching the potential climax to what has been a dramatic and unexpected resurgence these past few years.

The history of Granada CF is a humble one.

After its initial promotion to La Liga back in 1941, the club has been back to the top-tier of Spanish soccer just three times since, the most recent of these seasons coming in 1975-76 when the club was ultimately relegated.

Their highest finish in La Liga is sixth, they have never won the King’s Cup, and only five years ago the club found itself in the lowly depths of the Tercera Division, the dismal fourth-tier of Spanish soccer.

Heck, when I first arrived in Granada to study abroad some two-and-a-half years ago and inquired about whether the city had a local soccer team, my program’s leader chortled.

“Yes,” he informed me, “but they’re very bad.”

Flash forward to this season and it’s evident El Graná is writing a very different story.

Led by Spanish midfielder Dani Benitez, Swiss forward Alexandre Geijo—currently tied for the league lead in goals with 20—and Ghanian defender Jonathan Mensah, who started for the Black Stars against the United States at last summer’s World Cup, the team that traditionally has always been so accustomed to packing its bags for the division below at season’s end can suddenly smell promotion’s sweet scent.

Despite a pallid run of form that’s seen the club go winless in its last five games, manager Fabriciano Gonzalez’s squad still finds itself seventh in the league table—a mere point behind this Sunday’s opponents Cartagena—with 11 matches to go.

And with the league’s top two teams guaranteed promotion at the season’s conclusion and clubs three through six set to battle it out for the decisive third promotion spot in a pair of two-legged semifinals as well a two-legged final, Granada appears to be in good shape to make the playoffs.

Especially when you consider that Barcelona B sits currently in fourth but can never secure promotion to La Liga as they are FC Barcelona’s reserve team, hence currently rendering Granada as the actual sixth team in Segunda.

That still might seem like a stretch for a club that hasn’t played in Spain’s top-flight division for nearly a quarter of a century. Nevertheless, the city and Granada’s followers are more abuzz than they have been in years.

One of the club’s more ardent supporters is Javier Jimenez, the headmaster at CEIP Victoria, a primary school not far from Granada where I have had the pleasure of working as a Language and Culture Assistant this year while living in the city proper. He knows why I am in his office today, and he’s all too eager to discuss all things CF.

With one of the most enthusiastic expressions I have ever seen on the face of a school president, in Spanish he regales me about the history of Granada’s most famous soccer club.

He explains to me how CF was responsible for creating the red vertically-striped shirts worn nowadays by Atletico Madrid (Granada wears red horizontally-striped shirts, much like those of Major League Soccer’s FC Dallas, a point that Jimenez duly notes) thanks to a factory error.

He goes on to say why there are presently 11 players at the club including the aforementioned trio of Benitez, Geijo and Mensah who are on loan from Italian outfit Udinese (both club presidents are good friends).

He also mentions the sheer amount of agonizing pain that comes with being a Granada supporter and how he has been a season ticket holder nearly all his life.

“When I was growing up, my [older] brother had a season pass and whenever he couldn’t go, I went,” says Jimenez, grinning from ear to ear.

“Now, every weekend I take my son,” he states proudly flipping open his cell phone and showing me a picture of himself with 16-year-old Fernando, the two decked head to toe in CF gear at Granada’s Estadio Nuevo Los Carmenes.

From the ebullient manner in which he talks about CF, it’s clear that Jimenez has a special place in his heart for Granada. But like any Spanish soccer fan whose true loyalty lies with a club that isn’t Real Madrid or Barcelona, the backing of their local “inferior” organization seems futile as the two giants typically reign supreme over all with each passing year.

It is therefore commonplace for Spaniards to root for either Real or Barça in addition to supporting their local club, and Jimenez confirms this notion poignantly.

“I have one team to enjoy, and another to suffer by,” he tells me with a chuckle, alluding firstly to Real.

Prior to our meeting in his office, I had only ever heard my boss discuss soccer’s current events pertaining solely to Real Madrid, so I had to pose the obvious question: Real or Granada?

“Granada,” he interjects before I can even finish the question. “I don’t usually cry, but last June when they won promotion to Segunda, I had tears pouring down my face.”

Surely, the sentiment in Granada and its surrounding towns mirrors that of Javier, and the city itself has made evident its bourgeoning passion for the beautiful game and its local club in recent times.

This past weekend Los Carmenes was the host of an entertaining and successful Euro 2012 qualifier between Spain and the Czech Republic, a match that La Roja won 2-1 and saw David Villa surpass Raul as his country’s all-time leading scorer.

There are already plans to add at least 4,000 more seats to the stadium’s diminutive 16,000+ size should Granada make La Liga.

There are posters at almost every bus stop in the city promoting its local soccer team with a limited edition Granada CF bottle from the neighborhood brewery Alhambra, whose beers are named after the majestic Moorish fortress that overlooks the city.

When I ask Jimenez what it would mean to him personally if Granada were to make La Liga at season’s end he responds in English:

“A heart attack!” he cracks, howling with laughter.

The optimism and excitement exuded by Jimenez and his contingent of local supporters is palpable throughout the city and is perhaps best expressed in the red and white tagline accompanying the illustrations of the Granada CF bottle and team logo on the Alhambra posters: Un año mas seguimos soñando juntos. One more year we continue to dream together.

For the city of Granada and its clubs supporters, dreaming might not be necessary for very much longer.

FC Barcelona Legends: Ranking the Top 10 All-Time Barça Players

When you’re dealing with the best club in the world, compiling any list of rankings is difficult. Now try compiling that same list, but having to sift through the entire comprehensive and illustrious history of that club, as well as each and every person that ever threw on the Barcelona uniform. That is precisely the task that I recently undertook, and while this list of the Top 10 All-Time Barça Players might not be perfect, it’ll have to do for now.

10. Rivaldo

Although he was poached from Deportivo de La Coruña back in 1997 for a cool 4000 million pesetas (about €19.5 million), the Brazilian still left an indelible mark on the club for which he played six seasons from 1997-2002. The attacking midfielder, who became the first of many players whose surname terminated in “o” to shine at the Nou Camp, tallied an impressive 130 goals in all competitions during his Barça career and in 1999, won both the FIFA World Player of the Year Award and Ballon d'Or in guiding the Catalans to the La Liga title.

His career-defining moment at Barcelona came back in 2001 in the last game of the season against Valencia. In a 3-2 victory, Rivaldo secured a hat trick with an astounding bicycle kick from outside the box in the 90th minute that found the back of the net and sent the home supporters into an unbridled frenzy. Not only did the mesmerizing strike give the club a victory, but it also guaranteed Barcelona a spot in the following season’s UEFA Champions League. Oh, and it was also Rivaldo’s 36th goal of the year: a season-best for the Brazilian attacker.

9. César

Uhhhh….who? The man whose birth certificate read César Rodríguez Álvarez, but who opted to be called by the singular praenomen, played for Barcelona in what might appropriately be referred to as the olden days (1939-1955), and amassed a supersized total of 235 goals in 351 games for the Blaugranes making him the club’s all-time leading scorer to date. Yes, the game was much different back then, and yes, in 1999 a fan's poll declared teammate László Kubala to be the best player to ever suit up for the Catalans, but you can’t formulate a list of the best players in Barcelona history without including their top scorer….can you?

8. Pep Guardiola

The slender, Santpedor-born defensive midfielder served as the backbone of then manager Johan Cruyff’s Dream Team that won four straight La Liga titles from 1991-1994, including the double in 1992—the year the club captured its first ever European Cup when Guardiola was just 20 years old (he contributed significantly to the club’s second run at a European crown, too, when they lost to Milan 4-0 in the ’94 Final).

Being the current manager of the club at which he thrived during his playing days ensures that his legend at Barcelona will continue to grow, albeit from the sideline. But hearing players like Xavi Hernández and Andrés Iniesta admit that Guardiola was their hero and a role model growing up, and then watching them strive to emulate their manager’s former style of play on the pitch week in and week out suggests that Pep the player’s influence at Barcelona has been both contagious and interminable; surely, without those two players, Barça would be far worse off.

7. Carles Puyol

The man who looks more like a golden retriever than a footballer has captained Barcelona for the last seven years and just might be the best defender in club history. The 32-year-old center back has been the undisputed leader of one of the most impermeable back lines in Europe since being handed the armband back in 2004 and has four La Liga titles (2004-05, 2005-06, 2008-09, 2009-10) and two European Cups (2006, 2009) to show for it. And if the 5-0 thrashing of Real Madrid is any indication of how the rest of this season will play out, one more of each trophy could be on the way. It’s difficult to cement Puyol’s ranking on this list, seeing as how his career at the club is still on-going, and he is a defender—a position that is often overlooked—but make no mistake: no one is better suited to be the skipper of the world’s greatest football club. We’ll keep him at number seven…for now.

6. Andrés Iniesta

Another active player whose exact ranking on this list was tough to determine, AI8 is already one of Barcelona’s greatest midfielders ever, despite his still tender age of 26. Though hampered by injuries that limited him to just twenty starts last season, Iniesta capped off the 2009-10 campaign with the game-winning goal for Spain at the 2010 World Cup Final, and there are few that believe Barça’s 5’7” talisman is on the downward slope of his career. With shots like the last one fired in South Africa, and the one two seasons ago at Stamford Bridge—which knocked Chelsea out of UEFA Champions League Semifinals from 11 meters out—surely, he is still on his way up.

We must also remember that had Iniesta not made his crucial shot at Stamford Bridge (which just so happened to be Barça’s first of the night), the club never would have had a shot at Manchester United in the UCL Final, and therefore, never would have been able to complete their historic treble—the first Spanish club to complete the feat. And with the previous year’s team having failed in semifinals against Manchester United, who knows what changes would have been made to this presently unbeatable squad. The goal was a critical one for Barcelona, to say the least.

Couple his scintillating style of play and clutch goals in crunch time with the generous accolades doled out by his contemporaries (Samuel Eto'o and Wayne Rooney both have recently claimed that Iniesta is the best player in the world), and you might just have the most legendary midfielder in the game today. It’s just too bad the only one who really comes close to rivaling him is playing right next to him.

5. Johan Cruyff

Thought by many to be the man who started it all for Barcelona, the Dutch international will go down in Catalan lore for centuries to come. Upon joining the club from Ajax back in 1973, Cruyff informed the papers that he had chosen Barça over Real Madrid because he could not play for a club associated with Spanish dictator Francisco Franco (if that isn’t a microcosm for the dichotomy that is still prevalent in the Spanish political and cultural landscape today, which both clubs duly exhibit, then I’m not sure what is).

But it was on the pitch that the flying Dutchman did most of his talking. He scored 48 goals in 143 league appearances for the club, and in his first season guided Barcelona to their first La Liga title since 1960, picking up the Ballon d'Or in the process, and winning the prestigious award again the subsequent season.

However, most supporters will argue it was on the sideline where Cruyff crafted his enduring legacy at the Nou Camp. He became manager of the club back in 1988 and introduced the tiki-taka style of play that Barça continues to employ today. The short passing and patient movement as well as the maintaining of ball possession has been frustrating and vanquishing opponents ever since, and the organization has a former chain-smoker from Amsterdam to thank for it.

4. Samuel Eto'o

If there was ever a player that Barcelona may live to regret giving away, the Cameroonian forward might just be the one. In five seasons at the Nou Camp, Eto'o scored over 100 goals; won three La Liga titles, two UEFA Champions Leagues (becoming just the second player of all-time to score in two separate UCL Finals), and two African Footballer of the Year awards; and became the record holder for number of La Liga appearances made by an African footballer.

And had Barcelona decided against swapping him and €46 million for letdown Zlatan Ibrahimović two summers ago, it might have been them instead of Inter who owned the rights (and the trophies that came with him, I might add) to the first player in football history to ever win two consecutive trebles. Love him or hate him, Eto'o was (and still is) a magician of sorts and perhaps the greatest striker Barcelona ever had. Results of late may suggest the Catalans are fine without their former attacker, but what exactly was the problem with having Eto'o up front in the first place? Oh yeah, that’s right: he scored too many goals in big situations. Go figure.

3. Lionel Messi

I’m not sure if this player even merits a blurb; the name and picture should be sufficient. At just 23 years old, Messi is just about the greatest football player on the planet (I say just about because I happen to be one of the few who still believe Cristiano Ronaldo to be slightly more talented). He is the current holder of the FIFA Ballon d'Or (an award he’s won twice now), he’s won four La Liga titles and two European Cups for Barcelona and, most importantly, HE’S STILL 23! In 247 appearances for Barça he’s already bagged 167 goals and dished out 67 assists in all competitions—numbers that are certain to balloon significantly should he maintain his rampant pace over the next several seasons.

There will be those who read this list and look on the number three attached to Messi with great resentment, feeling as though the little Argentine got the short end of the stick. To those people I say that by the end of his career, assuming he doesn’t succumb to a catastrophic injury or get sold away, Lionel Messi will undoubtedly be the greatest player in FC Barcelona history. But right now, I think third is appropriate, considering the growth he is still yet to experience. After all, had you fully reached your potential at 23?

2. Ronaldinho

Let’s be honest: at some point over the last ten years, we all wished we were Ronaldinho. Thanks to his dazzling style of playing while at Barcelona, it’s easy to see why.

During the majority of his career at the Nou Camp (which coincidentally turned out to be his prime), it was nearly impossible to name a more exciting player in the world of football. With exceptional dribbling, enthralling trickery, and emphatic finishing, the Brazilian forward wowed everyone who feasted their eyes on his superior quality. In five seasons for the Azulgranas, Ronaldinho tallied 95 goals and 80 assists, winning the FIFA World Player of the Year award two years in a row (2004, 2005), one Ballon d'Or (2005), two La Liga titles (2004-05, 2005-06), and one European Cup (2006), thus etching his name into the history books as a living Barcelona legend. Heck, when his current club AC Milan played Barcelona in an exhibition match earlier this season, Ronaldinho joined in on the Barça team photograph and flashed his signature bucktooth grin as if he had been there all along.

He may not be there anymore because he partied too much, but can you really blame him? If you were Ronaldinho, you’d have probably done the exact same thing.

1. Xavi

The man whose disyllabic moniker has become a byword for class is currently, without question, one of (if not the most) gifted midfielders in the world. Even if you only recently started watching football and tuned in for Barça’s showdown with Real Madrid mere months ago, it’d be difficult to say you weren’t incredibly impressed with the midfield magician’s performance. Xavi completed a La Liga season high 110 passes that night and notched the game’s opening and decisive goal on a deft flick past Iker Casillas after a whirlwind of passes torched the archenemy’s backline. It may have been a stellar showing, but it was just business as usual for Xavier Hernández.

Since the start of his career in 1998, he’s helped the club win five La Liga titles and two European Cups, and many feel he probably should have won the FIFA Ballon d'Or as the world’s best player in 2010 back in January.

Xavi may not be the flashiest player on the pitch. He may not be the fastest either. He doesn’t score as many goals as some of his teammates, and rarely is in the spotlight. But anyone who knows football will tell you that the man that wears number six on the back of his jersey is the most instrumental player on the pitch at any one time for Barcelona. Messi and Villa may score the goals, but Xavi sets them up with his astounding vision and his eye for precise passing with pinpoint accuracy. He is the calm and composed orchestrator of the midfield for the best football club on the planet. Without him, there would be no Barcelona, at least as we know them today, and his legend is still growing as we speak.