To arrange for your artical to be placed here please send your artical to the following
e-mail:
We will strive to produce each week an informative news service which will reflect your personality and the strengths of our league.
Please feel free to forward any of your opinions or articles refering to your team or the league (let your imagination flow, to me, the editor, on [email protected]
Please enjoy a good read.
Yours
Philip Reynolds - Editor
The first ESMS Newpaper to have a dedicated page 3,
These picture have been supplied by:
Sweet Start for Barcelona
FC Barcelona's manager, Albert Jorquera, was delighted after snapping up two hard worked wins at the beginning of the Star Division season.
"Experience has shown me that if you want to be ahead of the table you have to win almost all the points at home, and we have taken 6 from 6," said the Catalan manager. "anyway, we still haven't done anything. There's a long path to run until the end and it has just begun."
Barcelona defeated Juventus 2-1 in the first match and snapped a miraculous win in front of Bayern Munchen 4-3. "Lucky? Well, if losing 0-2 at 9 minutes and then scoring an own goal after the 1-2 is to be lucky then you should tell me what is bad luck," shouted the manager to a journalist from El Mundo Deportivo.
"There are few teams able to reverse a 1-3 against a mighty Bayern in this league. We did it and I can't say that I'm not proud of the lads." Jorquera specially cheered Javier Saviola saying, "The conejo (rabbit) is impressive. He has scored 5 of our 6 goals and is leading the scorers table along with Owen. I hope he can retain the title of top scorer because that'll mean that we'll be in the top 2 or 3. If we depend too much on him? Well, we have Rivaldo and Eto'o, but it's obvious that Saviola is a player able to win a match for himself."
The manager also pointed to Overmars' two assists and the other 'hot' player for FC Barcelona right now.
FC Barlcelona will now try to recover from the defeat at Olimpico de Roma against Lazio (1-0) in the first round of the Pele Cup. "We weren't well, specially up front, but we didn't deserve a defeat. I think a 0-0 would have been more fair, but this score will show us that there's no easy rival and we have to do our best in every match.
SLFA Goes Global
The Star League Football Association Board have proudly announced that we are to take part in International games against other leagues in the EOFA. Our first game will be a friendly against APL on 12th August 2003.
As this is the first time that the SLFA has taken part in this type of competition, it has been very difficult to understand the best qualities needed to manage the International Squads. Therefore, it was decided that the first few International Managers for both the senior and Under 21 squads are given a trial run of 4 matches each.
Using this method, it is hoped that the best manager will be found reasonably quickly but the decision as to whether or not we will have a permanent manager has yet to be taken.
The first senior team manager will be Oliver Newman of Premiership Champions Real Madrid frollowed by Shawn Grace after 4 matches have been played. The Under 21 boss will be Stephen Beddie of French team Lyon, followed by Chris Ransom.
Senior Squad:
GK: Hedman (bay), Casillas (mad)
DEF: El_Karkouri (mad), Burdisso (juv), Hyypia (liv), Stam (laz), Nesta (laz), Alpay (psv)
MID: Maas (psv), Gerrard (liv), Battaglia (laz), Figo (mad), Van_Bommel (psv), Rosicky (lee), Rochemback (fcb), Zidane (mad)
ATT: Saviola (bay), Shevchenko (mil), Raul (mad), Kluivert (bay), Thomasson (ars), Alessandro (riv)
Under 21 Squad:
GK: Verbist (gre), Kavanov (riv), Silly (lyo),
DEF: Navarro (aja), Popovic (fey), Farnerud (liv), Bonera (gal), Brown (boc), Search (ran), O'Shea (man)
MID: Boateng (man), Ednilsson (ben), Van_Der_Vaart (Ben), Robben (ben), Pergl (ars), Viana (riv), Brighi (juv)
ATT: Eto'o (fcb), Defoe (man), Pepe (bay), Cavenaghi (riv)
Watch out for full match reports from our future international matches here in your SLFA Express.
We would welcome your comments on the squads chosen, tactical errors you feel have been made in the choices etc.
Real Madrid Back To Form After First Week Defeat
Leeds United 2 Real Madrid 4
Keane 6, 28 Raul 7(pen), Figo 45, 56, Campbell 65
Real Madrid returned to winning form in the league with a good 4-2 win at Elland Road on Saturday. The win was only marred by the sending off of Figo who will now miss the next two matches with suspension. The Man of the Match scored twice in 10 minutes after half time to firstly draw the Champions level and then give them the lead as they exploited the Leeds defensive frailties. Keane scored the first early on but Madrid replied instantly when Raul broke through the defence only to be brought down by Totti and the penalty was given. Totti received a yellow and Raul duly dispatched the spot kick.
Leeds snatched the lead back on 28 minutes when Keane headed perfectly into the corner against the run of play.
Raul had the perfect chance to get Madrid back on terms when Robinson pulled him down in the box for the second penalty of the game. Only for Robinson to pull off the save and concede a corner.
Leeds had their best period of the game running up to half time with several half chances going their way to put the game beyond Real. The sucker punch came with the last kick of the first half when the superb Helguera slipped an inch perfect pass through to Figo who slotted homw to equalise.
The second half startedquite equal until Madrid took the lead. Helguera again the provider as his long throw is expertly scissor kicked into the net by Figo, candidate for goal of the season.
Madrid started to pur pressure on the Leeds goal now and they were defending desperatly to keep the scoreline down.
The fourth goal was a collector's item scored by Sol Campbell. Zidane made good ground down the middles and slid the ball to Campbell on the edge of the box who had only one thing on his mind and drove the ball sweetly past the dispairing Robinson to seal the victory.
Only the sending off of Figo scarred an otherwise good performance and manager Newman will be pleased that his team are back from the dispair that was last week's replayed game!