Champions Thoughts

President Bill Clinton (the man who will be remembered as the guy who served as President right before the Worst President in U.S. History took over) once said "Even a pig finds shit sometimes." He said it after scoring a rare birdie on the golf course and was suggesting that even the meek get their day in the sun once in a while.

The same thought could apply to me: after humiliating myself most of the year with God-awful predictions, I correctly called the Champions League final yesterday being a 2-1 victory for Milan. It's nice to be right once in a while. I will now go back to being consistently wrong.

One could ALMOST apply the phrase to Milan as well; they played like pigs in the first half but came into the break leading 1-0. They probably were the superior team in the second, and deserved the win. Liverpool played well (except for their two wingers) but they played very defensively, even after going down 1-0. Its hard not to think the better team won.

It has been, as many have observed, a funny season for Milan and for Italy in general; I have covered many of the ups-and-downs in this space and won't start rehashing things yet again, but it is instructive how much a football season in Italy can reflect the vicissitudes of real life. Anyway, congrats to Milan, and kudos to UEFA for putting on a tournament that I, at least, really enjoyed this year.


On another note, with the end of UEFA Champion's League, it means the silly season of rumors and transfers can get underway. Much more on this as the summer progresses, but here is a fun column by ESPN's Jon Carter on potential transfers in the premiership.

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/columns/story?id=432875&root=england&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab4pos1&cc=5901