League Cup you mean. :p

This WC gave me quite a new found enthusiasm for football again. Mostly watched Premiership only last season...

I wish Spurs well now they have Duff and Keane hopefully they'll finish 2nd behind Arsenal

Tottenham, eh?

You might find this amusing then:

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/st ... ons/060719

Most Hated Rival: Any of the London teams.

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id=374175&cc=5739

Today's news mainly seems to be consolidation of the news from yesterday. Bayern apparently is back in the hunt for Ruud. I thought it interesting that this article mentions Hargreaves might be part of a deal for him to keep the cash figure down.

Interesting, Man U could certainly do with a player like Hargreaves, a great replacement for Roy Keane

Yeah, and from what I read it was Glazer's debt actually. One he raised to buy United. Many fans hate the man.

Yeah Glazer isn't very popular with the United fans, I have no idea were the logic of borrowing something like €400M to buy a football club came from.

Because that is how people like Glazier make money. I'll give you three examples: what he did in Tampa, Jerry Jones in Dallas, Daniel Snyder in DC. They ALL purchased their franchises the same way - they were heavily leveraged initial purchases - and in all three cases the franchise controls the revenue from the stadium. They then took about a year to consildate and to a degree expand certain revenues, then refinanced by increasing total debt but drastically reducing debt service. Using the expanded cash flow freed by the manuever, they then proceed to act in ways that allowed them to further expand the cash flow. All three franchisees are about as rich as they come in America, with Dallas, DC and the Yankees pretty much trading off the most valuble franchise designation. Interestingly, there was a point where all three were about as hated in their cities as Glazier currently. Well, maybe not Jones in Dallas, but then he got lucky with his first hire. You may also notice how two of the three have also delivered championships on the field, and the third at last seems headed in that direction. The other commonality is that these three are rarely outbid for players.

You can question how much of this model will sucessfully translate to the EPL, but from a business standpoint, how he did it and what he has done since on that front are perfectly consistent and make absolute sense. The one thing I doubt will be a problem is United having the cash to spend for players.

This round up has some interesting tidbits:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2006/s ... index.html

Possible Ronaldo-Adriano swap, some more info on Bayern ratcheting up their interest in Rudd, some other transfer rumors

And for Bodrul:

"Tottenham Hotspur manager Martin Jol could sell midfielder Michael Carrick for the right price. The midfielder has been a target for Manchester United and Jol insists £20 million maybe enough to sell him. -- talksoccer.net"