| Chivas USA Beats Toronto FC 3-0 Jorge Flores, Jesus Padilla and Rodolfo Espinoza scored in the second half to give Chivas USA a 3-0 victory over Toronto FC on Saturday night. feeds.nytimes.com |
Darren Bent: Missing out on World Cup squad hurt like hell | Interview After the heartbreak of being left behind by England twice, Sunderland's in-form striker is not taking his latest call-up lightlyDarren Bent not only prefers to look on the bright side of life, he has also had plenty of practice in seeking the silver lining. A player left out of two World Cup squads by the age of 26 has every reason to be sceptical about a recall by the manager who neglected him for the second of them. The Sunderland striker smiles ruefully at the suggestion that he is now an England regular, though he does appreciate the significance of being called up again after scoring his first international goal in Switzerland last month."I can't remember the last time I was involved in two squads on the bounce, to be honest," Bent says. "I would like to think I am going in the right direction now. I have worked hard after a difficult two years."Last season I probably worked harder than I had in my whole career to get back on track, but this has been a nice start to the season for me and the club. Everything is going well, the team is going well and the goals are going in so I can't grumble. I'm playing better this year than I was last year and hopefully the goals will keep coming."Bent will always back his ability to take chances, and his goal figures – 29 league goals in 45 games since his move to Sunderland from Tottenham in August 2009, and 125 in 295 league games overall – suggest he is firmly on the credit side of the ledger at club level. Even so, he freely admits his first international goal came as a relief. "It was a big, big weight lifted off my shoulders," he says. "It felt like it was never going to come for a while. But when the chance came I was confident enough to take it and I'm hoping there will be more."Not unreasonably Bent is hoping for a start against the group leaders Montenegro, who arrive with a 100% record, at Wembley on Tuesday. Not only because Fabio Capello's options are limited due to the unavailability of Emile Heskey, Jermain Defoe and Theo Walcott, but because his form for Sunderland this season suggests he deserves more than bit parts and cameo appearances."Everyone wants to play but I can't take it as a given," he says. "Peter Crouch's record for England is second to none." Crouch is now having to survive on bits and pieces at Spurs, however, whereas Bent, frustrated when he was frequently left out at White Hart Lane, had little hesitation in moving to a club that offered regular football."I do feel I have to score a lot of goals to be selected for England but I wouldn't have it any other way," he explains. "It's always nice to have something driving you on and at least I'm getting the opportunity to show what I can do at Sunderland. It's a big, big club and I play week in, week out instead of 10 minutes here, 10 minutes there. My game is better than that, and I was happy to join a club that would let me prove it. I'm playing the best football of my life and I'm happy at Sunderland."All I wanted to do was go somewhere and play every week. I didn't have too many conversations with Harry [Redknapp] at Spurs, to be honest. He had a way of playing and I didn't fit into his plans. But I don't hold that against him. He's a manager and has to make decisions. One of them was to let me go."A footballer's life can be a bit lonely at times but you have to keep going. I'm still quite young and I was never going to give up. Playing in the Premier League comes with pressure anyway. It has the best players in the world and you have to believe in yourself, even if others don't always seem to."Sunderland were able to help Bent over his disappointment in the summer too. As a 22-year-old he did not mind missing the 2006 World Cup too much, even though it must have been galling to see Walcott go unused even after Michael Owen's injury. "I was only just up from the Championship, and though I was getting quite a few goals I sort of knew I might not really be ready," he says."Missing out this year was a blow that hurt like hell. Even though I knew I was only 50-50 when the phone call came it was hard to take, but Steve Bruce was brilliant, Niall Quinn was brilliant and even the club owner called me for a chat. And my mum and dad kept me going and gave me hope. I went back to my mum's house and spent a lot of time with family and close friends. I just tried to get back to normal."There wasn't too much I could do to vent my anger and frustration, so I went on holiday. That was where I watched all the games. It felt like I was more of a fan than a player and I found I wanted the boys to do well. I was really disappointed at the way things went for them, but not half as disappointed as the players themselves would have been."That is typical of Bent, uncrushed by disappointment, enthusiastic even in adversity, and not at all ready to give up on his England dream."I haven't thought about retiring, especially not at the age of 26," he says. "I feel there are more good years in front of me. I'd love to play in a tournament, and my plan is to keep working hard towards the Euros. There's another World Cup after that. It might be too far down the line to think about but it drives me on."EnglandSunderlandPaul Wilsonguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Heart move into A-League top-six Melbourne Heart move into the A-League top-six after a goalless draw with visitors Gold Coast United at AAMI Park foxsports.com.au |
Keeping Rooney may be a hollow win Manchester United's off-form striker has doubled his money, while his club's structural problems remain. This is hardly an emphatic triumph for the managerAccording to Manchester United legend, as propounded by no less an authority than Sir Alex Ferguson, the day the club's modern, most successful era properly began was in late November 1992, when Eric Cantona took a look round Old Trafford and decided straight away that here was a stage big enough for the football of his dreams. The significance of the past week's ludicrously overblown events, whether you consider Wayne Rooney a greedy little ingrate with a manipulative agent or a fearless articulator of an uncomfortable truth about his club being held powerless in a web of debt, is that the second bookend has not been put into place quite yet.Between them, Cantona and Rooney threatened to box off all the handsomely bound editions of Ferguson's golden years. Posterity was preparing to record the beginning of the end of a quite magnificent period as the point where Rooney returned from a shocking World Cup and decided that he could do better for himself than Manchester United, when his endlessly resourceful manager unexpectedly obtained a stay of execution.From what looked like a losing position, Ferguson fought back to claim a draw. Those billing it as the latest victory in a line stretching back to David Beckham, Jaap Stam and the rest are not confronting the whole truth. This time the player got what he wanted, both in ramping up the terms of a new contract, which may have been the intention all along, and in letting the club, indeed the world, know he was not satisfied with mere reassurances from a manager who appears to be working under financial constraint.The question now is not whether Rooney can rebuild his bridges with team-mates and supporters – he is probably a hero in the dressing room for having the bottle to address concerns that have been bothering United followers for years – but whether the club can come good on its promises. Liverpool were congratulating themselves on keeping hold of Steven Gerrard and Fernando Torres in the summer, and look where they are now. A good many United fans refrained from mocking their great rivals when they were battling to stave off administration a couple of weeks ago because they admitted United could soon be in the same boat, yet those same supporters expected unquestioning loyalty from Rooney when it came to pledging his next five years to the club.While his decision is being presented as a successful outcome and a happy moment for United, not much in the real world, as opposed to Wayne's world, has actually changed. As in most feelgood films the happy ending merely provides a break from reality, it does not solve the underlying problem. As long as United are in debt and under their present American ownership, they will have difficulty, are already having difficulty, in keeping up with Chelsea and Manchester City. That those two have money to burn is an issue for the whole of the Premier League, perhaps the whole of football. It is not just United who are struggling to find a way to compete with unfeasible amounts of investment injected on a whim.But whichever way you stack it up United are not the team they were three years ago, and their recent recruitment, considering they received ÂŁ80m for Cristiano Ronaldo, has been conservative to say the least. Neither is Ferguson getting any younger, and though he has been masterful in the past few days, it is still his stated intention to step down within a year or two. No one could attach a shred of blame to Ferguson for the way in which City and Chelsea's money has skewed the balance of power in England, though the possibility exists that more conventionally funded clubs such as Arsenal and Tottenham could finish above United this season. Were that to cost a Champions League place it would be impossible to continue the pretence that all is still rosy in the Glazers' garden, as well as having dire financial consequences of its own.So even if Rooney is staying everything is not quite the same as it was before. The elephant in the room has not just been spotted but painted in stripes, and whether value exists in the market or not Ferguson will, sooner rather than later, have to acquire a new goalkeeper and a couple of midfielders, perhaps even make a signature signing, as he puts it, just to prove he has cash at his disposal.Rooney's U-turn has already spoiled one of the better jokes of the past week. Apparently the owners told Ferguson he could spend the Rooney transfer money on a big-name replacement. Who, the manager asked? Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink, he was told. Laugh? It's nearly as hilarious as Rooney considering a move to City because he has always been motivated by winning trophies. That joke is not funny any more, to quote another Manchester luminary, at least you could not find too many United fans tickled by the irony when Rooney appeared to be heading for the exit.It may have been cleverness or mere convenience on the part of the Rooney camp, but questioning the club's spending plans in exactly the same terms the fans have been using was an inspired negotiating ploy. It even prompted the otherwise admirable Manchester United Supporters' Trust to come out with one of the most treasurable soundbites of the whole farrago when they asked whether the Glazers' ambition matched not only Rooney's but that of the Manchester United supporters.There's a simple answer to that, and it is best expressed in dollars, but the idea that absentee American speculators buy up clubs in order to make supporters' dreams come true was just one more fanciful notion in a week that, even by Premier League, standards was far-fetched. At the point when Rooney was wiping everything else off the news, or during the Ferguson press conference that practically brought the country to a standstill, it was necessary to remind oneself that this was all about an out-of-form scouser with questionable out-of-hours habits who has yet to score a goal from open play for his club this season.If it was not always easy to work out whether to laugh or cry over a faux crisis manufactured over money, it still isn't. United are not in the pink just yet, let alone the black, and the Rooney diversion has had repercussions elsewhere. Roy Hodgson and Liverpool must have been mightily grateful for Rooney giving the media something else to talk about at the start of the week, while Gareth Bale's colossal performance at San Siro went all but ignored. Harry Redknapp immediately came out and said the Welsh wonder was not for sale at any price, while Bale assured Spurs fans he was perfectly happy at the club, which in normal circumstances would have made him a near certainty to join United in the next transfer window.United could do with a forceful left-winger, Bale is well on their radar, and Spurs have sold them good players in the past. Rooney, one imagines, will be watching January developments with interest, unless it is true what his detractors were saying when they thought he was on his way, and he is only interested in himself. It is probably not true, though the thought amuses City fans, that he watched Emmanuel Adebayor and co beating Lech Poznan on Thursday night and decided he would never get in the team.Manchester UnitedWayne RooneySir Alex FergusonPaul Wilsonguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Ronaldo, Messi light up Spanish league with goals Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi lit up the Spanish league with goals on Saturday as Ronaldo scored four times to lead Real Madrid after Messi ... rssfeeds.usatoday.com |