RF Football » Mexico

Highlighting Emerging International Stars

Richard Farley — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 09:55:31 +0000

While looking up information on Zenit St. Petersburg, this came up in one of my feeds.

FIFA has a piece this morning highlighting some new faces that a.) played roles in last weeks friendlies, and/or b.) look to play roles as competitive matches (i.e., Euro 2012 qualifying) loom. Soom of the players featured:

Neymar, Brazil, part of a “calculated gamble” by Mano Menezes (really?), scoring on his debut,
Paulo Henrique Ganso, Brazil, showed he could be a “standout for years to come.” Both were very impressive.
Mario Balotelli, Italy, made his debut, called-in by Cesare Prandelli and paired with Antonio Cassano.
Yann Mvila, France, was the teams “outstanding player” in a defensive midfield role, and
Loic Remy, France, showed flashes of “a bright future at international level.”
Joe Hart, England, was highlighted for his promotion to the first choice spot,
Kieran Gibbs, England, was called “impressive” on his debut, and
Adam Johnson, England, was called by Fabio Capello part of “the future of England.”
Vincent Aboubakar, Cameroon, scored against Poland. The 18-year-old Valenciennes striker would be a much-needed player for the Indomitable Lions should he settle with the national team.
Emmanuel Agyemang-Badu, Ghana, played 90 minutes against South Africa but has been on a radar for a while now, part of Ghana’s already-emerged generation of young talent.
Christian Eriksen, Denmark, was highlighted for making it into Morten Olsen’s team.
Moreno Costano, Switzerland, is a 22-year-old striker scored the winnder in his debut for Ottmat Hitzfeld against Austria.
Omar Gonzalez, United States, gets a mention, as does
Elias Hernandez, Mexico, for his debut against Spain.
For Spain (who played Mexico), Jesus Navas and Pedro are highlighted. It’s difficult to find unknowns amongst the Spanish internationals.
Jeremain Lens, the Netherlands, got his debut in a 1-1 draw with Ukraine.
Abel Hernandez, Uruguay, scored in his overdue debut. Just what Uruguay needs – another potentially elite striker.
Roman Shirokov, Russia, was back in the team after a two year absence.
For Sweden, Olo Toivonen and Emir Bajrami made debuts, each scoring in a win over Scotland.

There are some players on this list I’ve never seen. Of those I have, Abel Hernandez and Vincent Aboubakar are the ones that interest me most. Not saying those are the best of the lot. Those two are the ones I’m most interested in tracking.

Mexican Primera Previews at MAF, TKR, and Examiner

Richard Farley — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 17:30:37 +0000

Three articles, each with a slightly different feel, all about this weekend’s action in the Mexican Primera División.

First, at Man About Fútbol there is a general overview – a concise (well, as concise as I get) way of getting everybody up-to-date for this weekend’s matches.

You can find it here.

At my Examiner site, the attempt to bring the many Mexican fútbol fans to an English-language site begins, as I take the MAF content, massage it with my Edward Scissorhands, and publish it. I’m probably going to also write some wrap-ups of local college action (so they don’t fire me), but for the argumentative version of the MAF content, you can go here (if you read the MAF-stuff, you probably only need to read the first four paragraphs at Examiner, though there are tables on the Examiner site).

Over at The Kartik Report, I get a little more conversational and concentrate on one match: Puebla hosting Monterrey, which is a very exciting match, though the message is pretty much the same – I think you don’t watch this league, but you should, and this is why. You can find that article here.

I want to issue on disclaimer. There is this impression that a reader gets sometimes – a justifiable one – where they think the author is claiming expertise for merely publishing something. I am not claiming an expertise on the Mexican Primera. I’m just giving everybody a preview.

Inside the Six, Episode #8

Richard Farley — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 09:37:00 +0000

On the eighth episode of Inside the Six we previewed the U.S. Men’s National Team’s trip to Estadio Azteca with Fox Sports Senior Writer Jamie Trecker. We were also joined by Dave Topp.

[podcast]http://pointoneohradio.com/pods/its_episode08_20090805.mp3[/podcast]