The Victory of Eckermann

     

           On 30th Dec. 2012 the Swedish rider Henrik von Eckermann made it to the first place and won the important competition from the Rolex FEI World Cup™ Jumping series. It took place at Mechelen in Belgium and it’s the eight part of the Western European League. Besides him as a winner the men from Sweden also had another reason to celebrate because the third place was taken by their presenter-the rider Jens Fredricson who si 31-year-old. The competition started with 40 horses but only nine could make it to the jump off where they had to compete with the watch and find the best path to get over the higher obstacles. In the second round jump off von Eckermann clearly showed that he possessed better qualities and concentration together with his mare Gotha FRH. He led her carefully and fast enough to ensure his win in the jump off which requires balance, speed and turning skills. He also declared his desire to continue riding the 11-year-old horse which was earlier under the coaching of the German legend-Ludger Beerbaum.

NHL is Back

After 119 days, long four months of unsuccessful negotiations the waiting has finally ended. The NHL and NHLPA  have finally signed a new collective bargaining agreement for the next 8 to 10 years. The agreement was officially signed Saturday when the players voted for the signing of the the new agreement. Neither the NHL owners nor the players actually won in these negotiations. The one that benefit the most are the fans. After losing once again a bunch of games Gary Bettman and the whole league where entirely criticized for the fact that tehy alowed another extensive lockout. The losses are enormous. The league has lost 24 million a day in the lockout. besides that in America, where the audience is just limited and most people turn to american football and basketball. Thus it seemed that we are heading again for another lost season, but we were suprised and fortunately this Saturday the big show returns.

Here is the schedule enjoy the games and wait for more reports from the fastest game in the world!

Falcao's New Record

The goal-scoring machine Radamel Falcao scored once again in the match against Zaragoza yesterday. That way he became one of the top players of his club Atletico Madrid. It was his 18th goal for Atletico since the beginning of the season when he scored from penalty in the 38th minute of the match. This is a record umber of goal for the club. The brazilian player Baltazar was the only other player to score 18 goals in the first 19 rounds of Primera Division during the 1988/1989 season. Then he finished the season in La Liga with total of 33 goals and won the Pichichi Trophy for becoming the top scorer in Spain. However, Falcao probably won't win the same trophy, because Leo Messi has already scored 28 goals.

Tsvetana Pironkova is out of Australia Open

The best bulgarian woman tennis player in present times was eliminated from the Grand Slam " Australia Open"  in the first round. Tsvetana had not lost in the very first round since 2007 when she was bested by Akiko Morigami. Today she played a very tough match against Romina Oprandi which she sadly lost with a score of 6:4, 5:7 and 2:6. The match lasted a total of one hour and fifty-two minutes and was full of comebacks and breaks. The two tennis players had a total of 11 breaks during the match. Pironkova managed to best her opponent in the first set in which she managed to secure it with a break when the score was 5:4. However, in the second set, which was very close until Romina Oprandi broke Pironkova's service game at a score of 6:5. The third set was very one sided as Oprandi completely dominated and closed out the match with a score of 6:2. In the second round, she is going to face Julia Georges, who is ranked number 18 in the world.

Bayern Munchen - Determined to become a super team

The past week Bayern was having a series of test games against various teams to determine whether they are ready for the second half of the season. The first game was against Shalke 04. The clash of the German teams that are also competing in the Champions League resulted in a 5-0 victory for Bayern. Jupp Heynckes appears to have prepared the team well after the break so that now they are ready to face Arsenal in the Champions League and defend the first place in the Bundesliga. On Saturday, 12 January, Bayern Munchen faced the Swiss team on St. Jakob-Park in Basel. The Bayern players crushed the hosts with the classical 0-3 in front of 30 000 spectators. The goals in the net of the Swiss started in the 8th minute when the Croatian star of Bayern Mario Madzukic scored. Just 3 minutes later Schweinsteiger scored again and doubled the lead of the Germans. The last goal for Bayern was scored by the player of the French national team Frank Ribery just before the end of the first half. The last test game of Bayern was on 13.01 when they faced SpVgg Unterhaching from the 3rd Liga - the team where Tobias Schweinsteiger, the brother of Bastian, is loaned for a period of 6 months. Claudio Pizzaro opened the game with a goal in the 10th minute. The "Super Mario" of Bayern, Mario Gomez doubled the score in the 68th minute and formed the final result: 0-2. As these games illustrate, Bayern are more than ready for the season and the expectations are that they will preserve their form throughout the season, aiming at both the Champions League title and the Bundesliga, which sliped away from them last year.

 

Super Sunday Football

     Last week's Sunday was truly an eventful one. United supporters rejoyced, Citizens suffered last-minute disappointment and unbiased fans of football enjoyed a real treat. Though the Manchester Derby was stained by a few unnoticed fouls and a goal that was wrongly  ruled out for an offside, the refs did a good job and allowed the two teams to truly provide an entertaining show. In fact, one might even say that the decision to not count Ashley Young's goal was what allowed the match to become such a spectacle. The match itself started in United's favour and Rooney did not miss the opportunity to score. Twice. Reminding us of his early years in United, Wayne Rooney took on the position of center forward and did not disappoint. Man City had its opportunities during the first half, but failed to capitalize on them. The two teams went into  halftime with a 2:0 lead in United's favour. But City had a lot of fight left in them, still, and came out of the lockers inspired. The second half started quite evenly for both teams and fast football was displayed. No one was able to score, though, until Van Persie hit the right bar with an amazing strike, leaving the ball flying toward Ashley Young, who put it in the net with ease. This goal, however, was ruled out due to an offside, which replays show was a wrong decision. Man City took advantage of the frustration the United players were feeling and managed to score with a swift counterattack. The score was now 2:1 and City fans were cheering on their team harder than ever. It seemed to help, because the inspired Man City team crushed United in the next 15-20 minutes, managing to equalize the score. The frustration of United was deepening and they were running out of ideas. Sir Alex Ferguson knew a change was needed and substitutions were the way to go. Phil Jones and Danny Welbeck came in, revitalizing the right wing of the United attack. This change proved to be the key to United's victory, as the pressure on City defenders was too much and in the very last minutes of the match, Welbeck managed to take the ball from a tired City defender and pass it to Valencia, who was fouled. With the score equal at 2:2 and United making a ditch effort to win the three points, Persie took on the responsibility of taking the foul. His strike was strong, but aimed right at Joe Hart. Nasri, however, made an unusual decision and raised his foot, allowing the ball to knock off it and swerve right into the right corner of Hart's goal. Etihad stadium plunged into silence, with only the roar of United fans echoing through. In the end, Man United deserved the win and took the three points justly, but the City team should not feel disappointed, because they showed some impressive football and treated us with a real derby. The Manchester Derby.

 

Hristo Stefanov

Thiago Silva - A Humble Captain

Thiago Silva is one of the world-class defenders in modern football. And as you may guess, I am not talking about the former CSKA player, but about the Brazillian who plays now at PSG. PSG quickly gathered a lot of critics because of the policy they implied in recent years to buy contemporary star players. A policy that was first introduced by Sheikh Mansour in Manchester City in 2007, copied by Anzhi and Malaga new owners. One may say that PSG even went over the ilmit this summer. Apart from ensuring the signature of Napoli star winger Eziquel Lavezzi, as well as new talent Veratti, they also bought probably Milan's two best performers for the last football campaign - Zlatan Ibrachimovic and Thiago Silva. It is interesting to note that both players, and especially Silva insisted on the fact they wanted to stay at the club, however, Milan's financial problems forced them into selling the talneted duo. It is worth mentioning that Thiago Silva captained Brazil during the Olympic games football tournament and performed well, but his performance in the last two season with Milan was sensational and earned him praises from many critics and football players and coaches, including Milan's former great player - Paolo Maldini. The former Milan captain was stunned by the selling not of star forward Ibrachimovic, but of Thiago Silva's departure. He described Silva as brilliant player and a captain for the future of Milan. Now, however, the Brazilian central defender is playing for PSG, a club that cannot match the silverware of Milan at this moment, but has started a project that is both promising and efficient. And Thiago Silva is the centre of this project, he is captaining his new team in his first season with PSG, and he is also captain of Brazil national team. The latter team has never been famous for producing brilliant defenders, but Thiago Silva has proved many people with his performances that unlike many of his Brazillian colleagues he prefers do to his job in defence, and leave the attacking duties to the rest of the team. And this is one of his brilliant qualities, aside from his anticipation, speed, good heading skills, technique, tackling abilities, he also loves his job playing defence and plays with both passion and determination, he does not take risks by going on forward runs (take a look on Lucio or David Luiz) which can be dangerous, but often produce greater hazard for the defender's team. Thiago Silva is also very humbe in his opinion of himself, but this is another honorable quality of his character which complements with his football abilities and makes him so remarkable player.

                                                                  To be continued...