Toffees stick on Martinez

By David Lee Wheatley

Sought-after Spaniard seals Everton switch

Everton named Roberto Martinez as their new manager today on a four-year deal after agreeing a £1.5 million compensation package with Dave Whelan and Wigan Athletic.

The former Swansea boss forged a glowing reputation for flowing football during his managerial career thus far and the Goodison Park faithful will be hoping for more of the same from the new man in charge, as they attempt to take the next step up into the top-four Champions League positions. Having managed a top-eight spot in each of the last seven Premier League campaigns under David Moyes, the heat will be on to supply marked progression.

A mammoth task awaits Martinez, as not only will he inherit the dubious honour of following a well-liked manager into the Everton hot-seat, he’ll also be expected to work within a relatively tight budget despite lofty ambitions.

The Spaniard is certainly no stranger to looking for bargains and developing young players, but that was amid a backdrop of hugely supportive fans and a chairman that fully believed in him. The expectations at Wigan Athletic only extended as far as staying up in the top-flight and when the former Real Zaragoza midfielder managed to achieve that aim three seasons on the trot, it was deemed a mighty success. He won’t be afforded such luxuries at Everton, where they’ve become accustomed to top-half finishes.

Despite relegation, Wigan Athletic played some of the best football on offer in the Premier League last season, bar their hideous defending. Winning the FA Cup at Wembley against all odds will have softened the blow of demotion somewhat and certainly helped keep highly-rated tactician Martinez in the frame for any top jobs that cropped up.

New Manchester United manager Moyes left behind a good squad, but reasonably thin on the ground in terms of back-up. Should Martinez manage to keep hold of stellar names such as Fellaini, Howard, Jelavic and Baines, then his chances of replicating or even bettering David Moyes’ accomplishments at Goodison Park will be greatly improved. If he can quickly identify areas in which to strengthen, he can make his mark on the squad early, while also building up his options should any players get injured or suspended.

Everton played a mixed bag of long and short passing under their previous leader, with an emphasis on hard work and positional discipline. Martinez will encourage the passing game much further, while smoothing out the rough edges. Whether that makes the Toffees weaker defensively or not remains to be seen, but it’ll almost certainly make the Merseysiders a thoroughly entertaining side to watch.

This is the litmus test for the 39-year-old to gauge exactly how far he’s come in his managerial life up to now, as Everton are a big club and he’ll certainly feel the pressure to succeed at Goodison Park more than ever before. His ability to cope with that expectation level will be tested to the limit, but Everton chairman Bill Kenwright evidently feels the time is right to entrust Martinez with the future direction of his beloved club.

Twitter: @davewh1980
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Benfica's season in tatters

By David Lee Wheatley

Series of near misses leaves Eagles empty-handed

Everything was looking so good for Benfica with only moments to go in the penultimate match of the Portuguese Liga campaign.

The historic Portuguese outfit had gone the whole season unbeaten in the league until that point from 28 games played, but so too had their closest challengers FC Porto. A win for either side would banish the other into second place with just one game remaining.

The Eagles from Lisbon had a point seemingly in the bag at the home of their title rivals in that high pressure fixture, when the Estádio do Dragão erupted two minutes into injury-time thanks to a winning goal from Porto midfielder Kelvin.

Benfica had led through Lima after his strike on 19 minutes, but were pegged back by a Maxi Pereira own goal six minutes later. Even so, a point would’ve kept Benfica clear at the top and ensured they had the destiny of the championship firmly in their own hands.

Porto’s stoppage time stunner put paid to all of that and the visiting team sunk to their knees in despair when the ball hit the back of the net. They knew only too well that it put Porto in control with both clubs likely to win their final outings.

This set in motion a chain of events that saw the piece-by-piece demolition of their season take place right before them.

After the huge blow of defeat in Oporto, the UEFA Europa League final came quickly over the horizon and Chelsea lay in wait. Fernando Torres nudged the Londoners ahead, but a penalty from Oscar Cardozo soon tied the scores at 1-1. Benfica were troubling Chelsea and the Lisbon giants looked capable of causing an upset in Amsterdam. However, another injury-time sickener befell them in the form of a headed winner from rock-solid Chelsea defender Branislav Ivanovic.

The despair in the Benfica players’ faces was glaringly evident at the final whistle and within 5 days all of their hard work had been wasted. This was followed up by an expectedly easy 3-1 victory against Moreirense, while Porto went to Paços Ferreira and won 2-0 to claim the league crown by a point from their great rivals.

Still, one last avenue was open to the now shattered Benfica with the Taça de Portugal (Portugal Cup) final left to play.

Head coach Jorge Jesus took his men to the Estádio do Jamor, in Oeiras near Lisbon, determined to at least lift the trophy from the ruins of the campaign that lay scattered around them. Vitória Guimarães, the team that had finished ninth in the league and a massive 37 points adrift of runners-up Benfica, came into the tie as virtual no-hopers and went behind after half-an-hour with a goal from the Argentine Gaitán.

The Vitória fans were out to have a fantastic day no matter what and falling behind failed to dampen their spirits. Not in their wildest dreams did they believe that their beloved team could claw things back, but that’s exactly what they did.

With time ticking down, Vitória Guimarães equalised ten minutes from the end of proceedings through Soudani. The minnows followed that up with another from the boot of Ricardo only two minutes later and Benfica were done and dusted. It was too much heartache for The Eagles to take and they simply couldn’t rally sufficiently to get back into the contest. Meanwhile, star striker Cardozo appeared to shove his manager Jorge Jesus as he left the playing field, a gesture that he quickly apologised for in the dressing-room afterwards.

The spectacular implosion of a once-promising season has left all those linked with the club utterly shell-shocked and it remains to be seen how many players will be ready to give it another try next season. A few may feel the need for a fresh start and that could see several star names leaving Lisbon this summer for pastures new.

Having signed a new two-year deal today, it’ll be interesting to see how head coach Jorge Jesus galvanises his squad and finds his own motivation in an attempt to put Benfica back on top of Portuguese football once again.

Twitter: @davewh1980
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Mourinho bows out with victory

By David Lee Wheatley

Real Madrid coach headed back to Stamford Bridge

José Mourinho waved his goodbyes briefly to the Bernabéu ultras after his Real Madrid team swept Osasuna aside 4-2 in his final match in charge of Los Blancos.

It was a stadium sliced in half yesterday evening, one set of supporters in admiration of their departing head coach, the other in relief that the controversial Portuguese tactician is leaving.

Mourinho has endured a torrid relationship with many members of the Spanish press, some of his own players and a large section of fans during an eventful three-year stay in Madrid. After leading Real to the La Liga crown in 2012, many thought a period of domination of the Spanish championship would duly follow. However, that failed to materialise and great rivals Barcelona wrestled back the title at the first time of asking by a whopping margin of 15 points.

Real's Champions League campaign was steady, if unspectacular in nature, and they finally succumbed to a hungrier opponent in the shape of Borussia Dortmund at the semi-final stage; Mourinho's men suffered a remarkable 4-1 thrashing away in Germany before almost clawing it back at home.

It's on to previously trodden ground for the outspoken coach as a switch back to Chelsea and the English Premier League beckons.

The official Premier League website made a boo-boo in the early hours of this morning when posting a story dated Monday exclaiming José, the self-proclaimed 'Special One', had already signed on for a second stint at Stamford Bridge. The headline still appears on search engines, but when clicked on, it directs the reader to a 'PAGE NOT FOUND' message. The Premier League have been hurriedly trying to clear up the mess by simply stating the story appeared in error. There's no mistaking that Mourinho is definitely on his way back to lead The Blues; the only error is that they posted it a day early!

The man who won Chelsea's first top-flight league trophy for 50 years in 2005 is going to be back in the dugout at Stamford Bridge next season and will bid to defy the odds that are placed firmly against a manager going back to a former club and being capable of replicating former glories. If anyone can turn the tide on that old adage, it is Mr. Mourinho!

The English media, unlike their Italian and Spanish counterparts who've come up against José since, absolutely adored the Portuguese for his often outrageous and always entertaining press conferences. They were almost guaranteed a quality sound bite that they could utilise in a newspaper story or website article and in addition, the majority of English football fans also took to the now 50-year-old boss during his time in the country that lasted 2004-2007. His charismatic approach to the public side of life endeared him to many, with the possible exception of fans that follow Chelsea fiercest rivals.

As for the challenge that confronts him, Mourinho will find a different landscape to the one that he thought would greet him on his return just a couple of months ago. The task of going up against the wily old fox Alex Ferguson will have given the former Porto and Inter manager plenty to chew on, but now he will fancy his chances a great deal more versus the new man at the Old Trafford helm, David Moyes. Manchester City, with Manuel Pellegrini likely to be the new man in charge at the Etihad, will provide a stern test of any prospective title challenger and while Arsenal are still a team to be reckoned with, they've faded badly since the last time José was around these parts.

He will be expected to take Chelsea back to the pinnacle of European football by winning another Champions League trophy for the club, something he failed to do first time around. It's a regret of the new man that he couldn't do it in his opening spell in charge and he'll do his damnedest to add a third Champions League triumph to his personal coaching achievements.

In short, Chelsea's returning messiah will feel he has plenty to prove and all the capabilities to prove it on his return to the Premier League.

His reappearance in west London will be universally accepted by the Chelsea faithful and will be extra welcome to those that railed against the short-term appointment of Rafa Benitez. For many a Chelsea fan, it will be as though all of their Christmases have come at once!

Twitter: @davewh1980

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The Bilbao connection

By David Lee Wheatley

The link between two shipbuilding heavyweights

Shipyard and steel workers mainly from Sunderland, Southampton and Portsmouth, along with Basque students who had been studying in the British Isles, brought football to the port city of Bilbao in Spain around the late 19^th century.

A local newspaper advertisement in 1894, placed by a resident football fan, challenged the growing English colony to a match and it took place on 3^rd May that year. The result was a 6-0 thrashing of the locals by the English, but the interest in the sport burgeoned quickly from that point on.

Meetings were conducted with a view to establishing a new football club from 1898, until the founding assembly of Athletic Club gathered at Café Garcia in April 1901 to officially announce the birth of the new organisation.

There was a rival club in operation at the time by the name of Bilbao FC and they entered a combined team with Athletic Club, known as Bizcaya, in the Copa del Rey of 1902; a decision was soon made to join forces permanently. In 1903, the Bilbao FC club members authorised the merger with Athletic to form an alliance named Athletic Club de Bilbao.

Athletic set out by wearing white initially, before they switched to blue-and-white halved shirts similar to those worn by Blackburn Rovers.

It’s a matter of debate as to why they began using red-and-white striped shirts from 1910; one theory is that they took their inspiration from the shirts worn by the football clubs followed by many of the English workers, Sunderland and Southampton. However, some historians say it was the cheapest material they could muster and it just happened to be in those colours, so they went with red-and-white. A third school of thought is that an Athletic Club member was sent to England to purchase blue-and-white shirts for the team, but couldn’t find any and returned with the red-and-white they now wear instead.

The story of stevedore (loader and unloader of ships) Arthur Pentland co-founding Athletic Club during a stint working in the city's dockyards and being responsible for changing the strips to those also paraded by Sunderland AFC has no historical record and is possibly a myth built up by a mix-up with the name Fred Pentland, the revered manager of Athletic Bilbao between 1922 and 1933.

There’s no doubting that shipyard workers originally from Sunderland will have been heavily involved in the setting up of Athletic. It’s also highly likely that the Bilbao club’s eventual colours were a nod to those English teams that many of the exiles will have supported at the time, Sunderland and Southampton. It may well be true that the material was the cheapest available, but that probably only served to help clinch the deal!

The historical links between Sunderland AFC and Athletic de Bilbao go back to the very beginnings of the Basque-country club and will remain there forever in the form of the famous red-and-white stripes proudly worn to this day by both sets of players.

 

Twitter: @davewh1980