They have over 200 collages with over 20 leagues/conferences. With the bigger leagues taking a bigger cut of the money. The issue is they do not have an elite league i.e. The premier league in England nor do they have any prestigious tournament/cup like the champions league or march madness for basketball.

It’s crazy some of the collage stadiums hold over 50000 people and they sell it out each week. The follower-ship or these teams is simply breath taking!

I understand the need to have the different leagues but shouldn’t that have a simple round-robin style tournament that crowns a champion of champions? Or would be even cooler to have a promotion/relegation leagues. That way smaller collages could raise above the traditional collages.. It’s always nice to see an underdog win.

N.B. Collage is the same as university here.

https://twitter.com/TouchlinePundit

Right, enough of qualifying, down to the race. I’m currently writing from America so had the great pleasure of experiencing American commentary for the race, which is… Quite shit to say the least. The start of the race was edge of the seat action as is always the case with Formula One races this year. Vettel again failed to get a good start in the race and for that reason, he couldn’t turn the poll into victory, which is becoming a bad habit for the young German talent.

This start meant that Massa was able pip both Alonso and Vettel to begin with and took first place from the very first corner. Webber was also overtaken by both McLaren’s to make a decent weekend for Red Bull quickly diminish. After this very little happened in the race until Alonso claimed on his radio that he is faster than Massa. Felipe then retaliated to pull a 3-4 second gap between him and his team mate.

After this Fernando closed the gap and Massa was told on his radio “Fernando is faster than you”. This was probably the least subtle way of telling Felipe that he had to yield the place to Alonso because of his teams orders, which is illegal in Formula One. Massa was understandably pissed off at this and very cleverly yielded the position on the straight to make it obvious to everyone. As a result Ferrari will be investigated further after receiving a $100 000 fine.

Personally, I can understand both view points. Ferrari want their driver to win as Alonso is far ahead in the Drivers Championship than Massa. That being said, Massa is also their driver, and Formula One is about drivers racing and battling for first position. If Alonso was that much faster than Massa, then he could have easily passed him by himself to WIN the race, rather than be handed the race.

Alonso always has been an amazing driver but a twat for calling Massa’s pace “ridiculous”. I feel sorry for Massa and hope he can prove his critics and the rest of Ferrari wrong in the coming races. It wouldn’t surprise me if Massa decided to leave Ferrari after this year’s contest.

Hamilton and Button were somewhat quiet in today’s events and more concerned with saving fuel to get them to the end. This has occurred a few times this season which could be a worry if these drivers find themselves in a situation where they must apply full throttle to secure the win. I expect more from the McLaren’s in the coming races especially with Hamilton leading the Drivers Championship.

More next week from the Hungarian qualifying and GP.

BBC Formula One

Yahoo! Formula One

We’ve all admired Joe’s abilities in the past since he has been one of England’s best consistent player. His natural flair and ability to pass players is an aspect which many English players lack these days. But I do think he is a bit of a douche for going to Liverpool, a team which failed to qualify for this years Champions League. A player like Cole is completely capable of playing at the highest of levels. He said however that the fact of playing at Anfield made up his mind instead of Arsenal or possibly Manchester United. Well, he could have easily moved to Arsenal to play at the Emirates and play at Anfield at least once a year.. Bet he didn’t think of that!

But good luck to Joe.. Hope he plays well under their new management, more for England’s sake than Liverpool’s!

Right, on the Eduardo! I think it was a good decision for Arsenal to let him go. The Croat hasn’t looked the same player since his horrific injury and under Arsenal, he won’t get as many chances to get minutes.. Which is all he really needs to get back to his immense finishing ability. Whether he’ll come back to the Premier League, I doubt as he didn’t really prove to be amazing unless a lower spot in the league team think about getting him!

On to James Milner who asked to leave Aston Villa, which was later granted by their manager Martin O’Neill. Milner is a decent young player with plenty of potential as his crossing ability was second to none in the World Cup. Where will he move to? I’m not sure. I don’t think he’s ready to play week in week out for a big Premier League team so maybe he would be better staying at Aston Villa. The only team I can think that may pick him up is Manchester City. But they’re too busy throwing cash at any player who moves so even then, it may not happen.

More soon.

A player to keep an eye one

[1] West Ham Sign Barrera

Anyway, moving on to the last 16, the first two games will be played on Saturday with Uruguay taking on South Korea and USA taking on Ghana, both games are equal match ups with nations coming from two very different footballing backgrounds. The winner of these games will face each other in the quaters and this is a great opportunity for an underdog nation to get to the semis of the world cup. I predict Uruguay to make it.

The next four, our beloved England play on Sunday against the Germans, if it goes anything like the war we will win, providing the USA team come on at half time and its 22 against 11. If it goes on previous football meetings, its pretty even, if it goes on previous World Cup meetings, then sadly England are 2^nd favourites. If England and when I say England, I mean Rooney and Gerrard, find their magical form they own at their clubs, then we should be fine. The second team on Sunday, Argentina and Mexico, I’ve never heard or seen these teams play so I’m sure England would breeze through if they got through.

Third four, Brazil v Chile, Netherlands v Slovakia, well, on paper this looks straight forward, but we know Holland can self destruct and Chile are not half bad, they gave Spain a scare and they were down to ten men half the game. So interesting quartet but I predict Slovakia and Chile flying home on Monday.

Hmm, the last four, the most exciting, Ronaldo vs Spain, can you see the prick winking at bench after getting Sergio Ramos or Xavi Alonso sent off? I think this is a great opportunity for Spain players to wind him up and get him sent off because he’ll have to be on his best behaviour if he doesn’t want to piss off his employers. Will be a classic game. Paraguay v Japan, COME ON PARAGUAY (I have them on sweepstakes J

To be honest, their lack of passion is largely down to Capello and his selection. He broke his own rule playing Barry. Fine. Just keep your best player in Gerrard in the centre where he can be a driving force. Against the USA he was able to take the team forward with him, but today, he couldn’t do anything from the left.

Rooney was just shit. Not his fault.. Everyone bangs on about containing him to make sure he doesn’t do anything stupid. Well that’s Rooney. You take away his temper and you take away his fire. He just played for the sake of it!

Lampard should be dropped. One to give way to SG but also as he has no real impact on the game! Johnson was just poor. Even Terry had rubbish moments. Shaun Wright Phillips was brought on to have no impact on the game! Where was Joe Cole? Don’t say he wasn’t fit.. (Barry..)

I can’t even remember anything else. I actually fell asleep in the first half. England won’t win the World Cup playing like this. Capello has now got to let go of his strict regime and just put the fun back into their game. The players need to realise that a World Cup doesn’t come everyday.

I’m just so disappointed with that. I want my 90 minutes back please..

Yes, anytime I talk about Argentina it’s all Messi, they do however have an amazing squad, and the only squad that is as strong is of Spain’s, both teams have a bench that could win the world cup let alone the first team.

Tomorrows match promises to bring a great contest, South Korea showed great attacking football to beat one of the best defensive teams and former European champions, Greece, Park Ji-Sung was instrumental, and if they can bring this form against Argentina’s suspect defence, it could really be an interesting game. I predict Argentina to win but just, wouldn’t surprise me if it was a draw.

Greece Nigeria, don’t know, don’t care.

Nah only joking, this is one of those games where no one will really watch and only glance at the result, it probably will be an absolute thriller and I will then eat my words, and I hope they prove me wrong, but it will probably end 0-0 or 1-1, I think the top two of this group will be South Korea and Argentina.

Finally, France v Mexico, Mexico had a dodgy opening against South Africa who then got thrashed by Uruguay, they have obvious quality but not enough of it this year, let’s see more of Carlos Vela. France on the other hand are a waste of talent, and have a useless manager who can’t control his team, I made my thoughts about France’s performance on my last post, individual talents are an amazing but without a real leader on the pitch in Zidane, Viera, or Thuram, I can’t see them going far. Last games embarrassing performance hopefully have kicked them into life, and hopefully they have realised this is about a nation and not individuals, because if they put their talents together, I think they can be unstoppable. Lets see. No predictions, France are too unpredictable.

Well, after watching the game against the USA, I’m going to say no. Walking away without 3 points from a team who call this game “soccer” is just fucking stupid. Even the USA walked away from the match like they had won the game, that’s not a real international team. Take nothing away from their performance, they were pretty resilient against an okay-ish England squad.

Many people will, and are arguing that England starting slow can help their cause, mainly because that’s how they started in 1966, with a draw. To all fans who believe this, stop thinking about 1966!! That was 44 years ago and no one really cares anymore! It’s not happening right now, especially with the way England are playing, so just move on!

So why are England not in good shape to win? Well, I’m not disregarding them completely as I’m a big England fan myself. But I just feel they need to get better, and get better quickly! And I think, that needs to start with the player selection. The only player who actually shifted their weight against the US was Gerrard. I’ve been banging on ages about how he should have been made captain simply because it will force him to lift his game. And so far, so good… Take a bow son.

Rooney was pretty mediocre however, in fairness to him he wasn’t getting the ball enough to have a big impact on the game. Heskey did well, and because of it, forced our defence to play route one football. Something we don’t need to do! He also missed some decent chances to seal the game which any international striker at this level should be poking these away.

Shaun Wright-Phillips was a waste of a substitution. He started off well when he came on but then either did nothing, or did something wrong. Where was Joe Cole? Hasn’t he been our best player over the last four years or so? Excluding the times he was injured obviously. Johnson suprised be at right-back as he was quite influential going forward, really more that Aaron Lennon was. Lampard did pretty much nothing and thought he was Beckham for the corners. Yeah mate, let Gerrard take them!

Crouch was bought on too. Someone please slap him.. Mate you’re shit..

To be honest, I know I’m being a little harsh. But that’s exactly what we need. I’m all for Capello and mostly he’s been making some good decisions. Even the formation I can live with. 4-4-2 is what most of our lads are used to for their clubs. But I do feel the 4-5-1 with Rooney as a lone striker and Gerrard off of him would work far better.

Firstly, going forward, Rooney and Gerrard (our best players) are always on the same Merseyside wave length and link up well. With the support of Joe Cole and Lennon on the flanks and Lampard behind, it may prove to be a wise system. It will also force the team to get Rooney into the game more and put him in positions of scoring.

Defensively, a compact midfield with Gerrard coming back would certainly bewilder our opposition, especially the better sides. I suppose now will be an appropriate time to talk about Robert Green. I do feel bad for the guy, England do always get lumbered with crappy goalkeepers.. It even happened to good old Seaman! So to lighten the mood, I thought I’d end with some Robert Green banter.

What’s the difference between Robert Green and Justin Beiber?

Green knows how to drop his balls!

Whats the difference between Robert Green and a slag?

Nothing, they both let everything through!

More to come soon, England Vs Algeria preview.