Galacticos!
Two points in England separate three teams. Spain is a dead heat between Barca and Real Madrid. It’s six points between three sides in Italy. Four points between three teams in Germany. Four points between SIX sides in France. The Dutch league, the Portuguese league, the Turkish league, the Greek league, none of them have come close to being decided at this point.
In fact, amongst the so-called major leagues in Europe, only Scotland and Belgium could be considered decided.
This is the best club season across Europe in quite some time. There are a lot of tight races, a lot of good teams and a lot of the old guard are sweating how these races are going to turn out. To that end, there is an absolutely HUGE match in the French league today, as upstarts Montpellier take on defending champs Bordeaux.
Montpellier have played two matches more than Bordeaux, but the newly-promoted side is even on points with the champions and have proven to be a tough nut to crack this season. For Bordeaux (who will make up one of their games-in-hand on Wednesday), today’s match is absolutely key to their championship aspirations. It’s been long assumed that they will lose leading scorer Marouane Chamakh at the end of this season, so they need to capitalize while they have him and get back into the Champions League. As I said above, there are plenty of experienced sides very close to these two sides in the table, so this match is monstrous. Unfortunately, with the demise of Setanta USA, we no longer have an outlet to see these matches from the French league. So, if you want to see the match, you’ll have to use alternative methods to do so (I would suggest atdhe.net, but you didn’t hear that from me). The match kicks off at 3:00 PM EST.
Here’s the rest of the television/internet schedule:
Sydney v Melbourne 0900 FSC Plus (Delayed) [Australia]
Bologna v Napoli 0855 FSC/FSE [Italy]
Palermo v Livorno 0855 ESPN.360 [Italy]
Sampdoria v Lazio 0900 RAI [Italy]
Nurnberg v Bayer Leverkeusen 0930 GolTV [Germany]
Chelsea v Stoke City 1045 FSC Plus [England - FA Cup]
Everton v Hull City 1100 FSC/FSE [England]
Athletic Bilbao v Valladolid 1300 ESPN360/Deportes [Spain]
UNAM v Puebla 1300 Telemundo [Mexico]
Internazionale v Genoa 1445 FSC/FSE [Italy]
Real Zaragoza v Atletico Madrid 1500 GolTV [Spain]
Huracan v Tigres 1500 Azteca [Mexico]
Benfica v Pacos 1515 ESPN360 [Portugal]
Santos Laugna v Atlante 1700 Telefutura [Mexico]
America v Queretaro 1700 Univision [Mexico]
Sao Caetano v Corinthians 1700 GolTV [Brazil]
Independiente v River Plate 1710 FSE [Argentina]
You know the drill. Twitter, comments, blah blah blah. I need coffee. Enjoy the matches!
As long as PAOK doesn’t win the Greek League and Manchester United doesn’t win the Prem, I’m fine.
I’d like to point that this season the points of the top 6 teams in Belgium will be divided by two after 28 games… so not quite decided yet. (Though Anderlecht is too strong either way, I’m afraid)
I assume you mean the SPL, because we all know the SFL-1 is FAR from over!!
Okay, first off, I’m so happy to see comments on the Sunday post I could almost cry. But I won’t.
Secondly, yeah, the Jupilier League is far from over, it’s just not as close on first glance as the others are this morning.
And Fuse, UP THE COUNTY!
Landycakes came off the bench today (presumably because of the recent international friendly) and scored in his 14+ minutes of playing time.
Too bad Bruce Arena/the L.A. Galaxy/MLS are going out of their way to make sure it’s his last home match for Everton.
And TYER, I’m on vacation, I’ve got plenty of time to comment on a Sunday morning!