So obviously the news is everywhere that Roman Abramovich, the billionaire owner of Chelsea has fired yet another coach. Unmercilessly the "next big thing" Andre Villas-Boas wasn't even given the opportunity to see out the season, even though Chelsea (albeit probably not much longer) are still alive in the Champions League and can still make the top 4 in the premier league.
The season has been a shambles, but not as much as the coaching merry go round. AVB should've been given more time, but also so should have Ancelotti and really so should have Mourinho. Even before then. Barcelona won't win La Liga this season but Guardiola's job isn't in any trouble, in fact is being allegedly chased by Chelsea! When will this coaching merry go round end? Sure the money is good but who would take the position when even one bad run will see you fired? Maybe Roman needs to look at the real cause of the problem.
If you're a follower of the A-League or even read Australian papers you'd know about the stoush between Frank Lowry, billionaire and chairman of Football Federation Australia (the ruling soccer body in Australia) and Clive Palmer, billionaire and owner of Gold Coast united and A-League team. Or should that be former owner of GCU. His licence was revoked after a couple of breaches-
This is all really sad and I'm sure it can't have been an easy decision for Frank Lowry to make but the way the situation has turned out there's not much more he could do.
Gold Coast have worn shirts proclaiming "Free speech" in a match against an FFA directive, play to no crowds at Skilled stadium, fired their coach or he left after he disagreed with a promotion of a 17 year old to captaincy on the owner Clive's orders. Clive Palmer since then has launched a stinging attack on Frank Lowry, the running of the game and even launched his own organisation called Football Australia and has allegedly been trying to recruit players to form a "rebel league".
Now Clive Palmer's worth $5 billion so I'm sure he can do what he wants, get flown in a helicopter where ever he wants, owner a pet elephant or launch a campaign against a government looking to share some of the wealth himself and Gina Reinhart are acquiring from Australia's natural resources (though I do accept mining is a high risk high investment industry okay just to get that one out of the way).
But in regards to Gold Coast, Mr Palmer please stop it, don't take this to court. You haven't won. It's not good for the game for this to continue being news, so in the interest of the game please stop.
Chelsea around 18 months ago were on top of the world. Or at least England. The recent Double winners (the first time in their history) were being coached by one of the best managers in England in Ancelotti, the team was playing entertaining, high scoring and attacking football with scores showing their dominance in competition. Then it all fell away. They had a horrible run near the end of 2010 till 2011, didn't progress in the Champions League and spent a 50 million pound transfer fee (a record in English football for Torres) on one of the world's brightest stars who could not the find the net in a better squad.
Meanwhile a new manager at Porto, ironically enough Mourinho's start in top line management was also starting to make a mark, Andre-villas Boas (or AVB). But enough about the Mourinho comparisons and the fact he worked under him in a fair bit of his success. In his first season as manager of Porto they won 4 titles, the Portuguese Supercup, the Portugues Premiera Liga, the Portugues Cup and most importantly of all the UEFA Europa Cup the second biggest European competition outside the Champions League. It was this that really brought him to everyones attention on the world stage.
Porto played an entertaining brand of football also with exceptional defence that allowed them to remain undefeated throughout the season. It was no surprise that notoriously restless Abramovich moved Ancelotti on and then splurged out the highest transfer fee for a manger in history to lure AVB down to Stamford Bridge.
When signed he seemed a breath of fresh air, combative, emotional highly studios and intelligent, but since the start of the season things haven't gone the way they promised. Chelsea is in 5th position, unable to compete with the top 3 clubs in the league and dropping points against teams from eminently winnable positions. There are rifts within the squad and rumours of disenchantment with the manager, publicly from the likes of Chelsea legends such as Lampard and Anelka, the free-flowing style does not seem to be netting results and dammit Torres just cant seem to fire.
But despite the fact that firing AVB now will be the most expensive 1 season by a manager for a very long time, the fact is that Chelsea is a team in transition. Ultimately this is a team still slowly shedding the shells of mourinho's powerful consecutive Premier League winning team. Some of the young players brought in such as Mata and Sturridge do genuinely look the future of the club and up to it. Drogba, Lampard and Terry are still excellent players some of the best in England but eventually they will have to be moved on and results will suffer, because you can't lose quality such as that and expect a dip. And it seems AVB is aware of this hence why the controversial benching of Drogba and Lampard which don't seem to help results but are a statement to the future. A game one day hoped to be melded on the lovely Barcelona passing game. Lampard and Terry since being English are club legends so to keep them around would be a good idea but perhaps if Drogba wants good game time perhaps moving him on while his currency is still good could be an option. What a player though. AVB is slowly learning on the jobs, more about how to treat personalities in addition to tactics but if he lasts till next season the fruits of his labour might begin to ripen.
With former Blackburn star Chris Samba signing a £12 million deal to play for the newest extremely-rich-owner team on the block, means another big statement from Anzhi Makhachkala (great to say also). Playing in the Russian Premier League it is owned by billionaire Sulyeman Kerimov who bought the club only in January last year. Makhachkala is the capital of the republic of Dagestan and plays in a stadium with a capacity of only 15,000. The streets around the stadium are not well kept and Dagestan is a country struggling with ethnic tensions, terrorism and in some parts poverty. Although only 5% of the population now are ethnic Russians, the country is still under Russian authority.
So why did Sulyeman buy such a small team in not exactly a well-known sporting location in Makhachkala? He is going to pump $200 million into stadium infrastructure and in the surrounding area to get the stadium to UEFA regulations of a 40,000 capacity. The country is unsafe enough that the squad is still flown in on home games and their training takes place in Moscow, not exactly next door. Sulyeman is a noted philanthropist, setting up a charity with his name to help in developing Russian communities and is spending $100 million on a top class school for gifted students west of Moscow. He obviously feels that if the Makhachkala residents had something to bring them together, say a successful squad (Football being a great bridger) then harmony in the region can be slowly worked towards. One things for sure, with the money being spent, they won't fail as both Manchester clubs, Chelsea, Real Madrid and Barcelona, and PSG show that money does equate to success, which ever way you look at it.
Anzhi Makhachkala's big signings:
Guus Hiddink
(PSV Eindhoven, The Netherlands, Real Madrid, Real Betis,South Korea, Australia, Russia, Turkey, Chelsea)
