Money and fame didn’t change Karim Benzema.He is making a lot of money (500000 euro per year, but president Aulas promise to give him more) and big clubs like Barcelona,Madrid ,Milan or Manchester United are trying to sign him.But the french striker remain down to earth.

He doesn’t act like a spoiled star and continue to be modest, and take care of his family and friends.He doesn’t leave in a big mansion and doesn’t have super cars. Because he wished to stay with his family he still live in parent’s house and drive an old Audi.

“Is a bit crowded but i prefer to stay with my family rather than being alone in a big house.I need my the love of my family” confessed Benzema.

For the French press Karim Benzema is a role model .In sport and life.Here is a picture with Benzema’s house.

Posted on March 3rd, 2008 by admin
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Everything is working great for Barcelona.They recover in rankings and now they are only 2 points behind Real Madrid.Leo Messi and Ronaldinho are two of the key players of the catalan team.

That was not the case 2 months ago.Messi was injured and Ronaldinho was out of shape.At that time the the Spanish newspaper “El Mundo Deportivo” was writing some interesting facts about these two players.

It seems that Leo Messi has too many injuries for a young player.The 20 year striker has already 6 severe injuries(all muscle related).The explanations : Messi has an excess of muscular tension who accelerate the fatigue and stop him to force himself in the game.When he was young he receive a hormonal treatment that make his bones grow but also created a disequilibrium between these bones and their muscles .

Messi’s real problem is a muscular fatigue that make the muscles shorter.The human musculature has two types of fibers : the slow ones (type 1) and the fast ones (types 2a,2b and 2c).Each person has a different combination and on athletes the mix change according to the training schedule.This explain why a sprinter has 80% fast fibers and a marathon runner only 5%.Leo Messi has a big percentage of fast fibers which combined with his short stature make him a very fast player.His muscle are always tensioned and that is the cause of his many injuries.

Ronaldinho case is different.The Brazilian player cannot accelerate at once; he needs some space in order to gain speed.His best plays happened when he come into his own half making pressing and then recover the ball for a counterattack. When he start acting like a star and stop training he become a lazy player, receiving the ball in static positions and make his moves predictable.

If you remember the goals scored agains Real Madrid in that legendary 0-3 you will notice that in both cases he left from his own half and his muscles had time to tensions.When he reach in front of Salgado or Sergio Ramons he was in full trotle and could not be stoped.It seems that Ronaldihno realized what he did wrong, start training harder and he is getting back in shape.

Back to Messi.His sprints consume a lot of energy and because of that he need a longer recovery time.Another study pointed that Leo Messi has a fantastic game start but after time passes be become absent. In the end of the games he is again at 100%.The conclusion is that his muscles recover in the middle of the game and are in best shape in the begining and end.The Argentinian player needs also more recovering time than the rest of the players.If he is not resting proprely he suffer muscle injuries.

Along Kaka, Messi is the fastest player in the world.It doesn’t have Ronaldinho’s technique but because he has low center of gravity and his muscles are always tensioned he manage to do these fantastic sprints.If you look at him when is playing you will notice that most of the time he put the chin in the chest and bend.In this way his center of gravity is lower and the speed is higher.Many specialists said that is a miracle that a player so thin and fragile can keep up these days.Every match he receive a lot of hits and if his club will not take care of him we all gonna loose a fantastic player.

Posted on February 27th, 2008 by admin
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After he scored in Inter’s victory against Parma, Ibrahimovici jump over Mancini (his coach).Obvously Mancini didn’t manage to stand up

Posted on February 26th, 2008 by admin
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There are many explanations for Real’s drop : physical extenuation because the medical staff did mistake in the aftergame recovery, the exaggerated optimism given by the nine points in plus, a block suffered by all teams trained by Bernd Schuster (in the moment they reach the peak), many injuries, the absence of Robinho or Van Nistelrooy inefficiency (no goal in the last 6 games.)

To all these we can add one more.Real Madrid is affected by too many wins in a short interval.Such series brings points in charts but also makes the team vulnerable.The club gets used with success, reach the maximum level but when the team suffer a defeat it louse the equilibrium and hardly get back in the game.

Real humiliated Valladolid with 7-0 and everybody praise them.But when they suffered the first failure they didn’t manage to stand up.And it may take a while until they get back into game.According to a German specialist (Andreas Heuer) who analyzed over 12000 games, a team that won four games in a row has 25% less chances to win the next one.

Heuer study soccer since 1965 and he also realized that a team in this situation needs at least 8 games to recover and reach again a high level.Also he noted that changing the coach doesn’t work in these situations.

Posted on February 26th, 2008 by admin
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The most prestigious inter club competition in the world , the Champions League, a league dedicated to the most valuables soccer teams in Europe is dominated by the Brazilian players.Brazil is the country with the most players : 99 at this moment.Following Brazil at a big distance is France with 64 players and Italy with 55.Also the last players that won the “Best player in Champions League” are the Brazilians Kaka and Ronaldinho.

The massive movement of Brazilian players in Europe started in 2004 when Brazil exported 852 players.The most important transfers in 2004 was the movements of the Luis Fabiano from Sao Paulo to Fc Porto for 13,5 million euro and Diego from Santos to Fc Porto for 7 million euro.

In 2005 Brazil “exported” 870 players.The most expensive transfer was : Robinho from Santos to Real Madrid for 30 million euro.

In 2006 the number of brazilian soccer players that left Brazil to play in ther leagues was close to 900 and the total value of these transfers was around 131 million dollars.

2007 was the year was the first year in history when Brazil exported over 1000 players.1086 to be more precise .The massive exodus had a positive effect for Brazilian economy.Their GDP (gross domestic product) was bigger with 4.7% putting the country on the top 10 list.In this way soccer brought more money than coffee production or Rio’s Carnival.

This year there were only 5 teams that start the competition and didn’t have Brazilian players : Steaua Bucharest, Olympique Marseille, Rosenborg, Celtic and Glasgow Rangers. Only Celtic pass the group phase and doesn’t have big chances to advance.

Posted on February 26th, 2008 by admin
Filed under: Champions League | No Comments »