Crosswalk

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Hi, my name is Doug, and I used to hate soccer.

I imagine that sounding like your run-of-the-mill A.A. group that meets every Tuesday night in the church basement.

Anyway, after the World Cup last year I have become completely hooked on ‘futbol’. Now, I am a card scarf-carrying Arsenal fan.

You may remember Kyle’s English Premiere League primer from 2013. If you don’t, go read that now. I’ll wait.

Good, now that we are down with the same JARGON, let’s get into why we’re here: the EPL season has ended and Chelsea has won the league (gross). However, in nary a month the transfer window will swing wide open, allowing all the teams across the world to throw Chris Christie-size piles of money at each other for their players.

Let me explain: the transfer window is only open twice per year –in the winter for a month and in the summer for two months – and is the ONLY time a player can move between teams. Also interesting about soccer transfers is the general aversion to player-for-player trades. Instead teams swap players for Straight Cash Homie.

Good, now that we got that out of the way, let’s get into why we’re here. Transfer rumors are afoot and we have an entire month to speculate who is going where. Who will move to England and help their team challenge Chelsea for the EPL title? Who will be the soccer equivalent of Vinny Lecavalier? Who will Tottenham buy, just to stew with them in the dredges of mediocrity for ever and ever?*

Let’s SPECULATE.

Chelsea – Radamel Falcao – Striker
The stringy-haired Colombian joined Manchester United this past season and we all enjoyed the hilariously bad results. Touted as a top finisher in the world, Falcao scored just four times for ManU this season and managed to look TERRIBLE while doing so. But it doesn’t seem that his EPL days are over quite yet. While the Red Devils may be done with him, it looks as though Chelsea is giving serious consideration to acquiring his services. Based on last season’s performance, I can only imagine his role on the team would be shining shoes and fetching water bottles, but I have been wrong before.

Manchester City – Everyone – Everywhere on the pitch
Man City finished atop the EPL just a year ago, but HOT DAMN, did they start to show their age this season. The team boasts an average age of 29 years, and I don’t need to tell you how old 29 is. It’s ALMOST 30. And once you hit 30, as a man you become useless… unless of course the new goal of soccer is to be winded 20 minutes into a 90 minute game and then mentally check out, leaving your team to play around you for the remaining 70 minutes, at which point, can someone give Yaya Toure an award? Man City has a full-scale rebuild on their hands, and it won’t be pretty.

Arsenal – Gonzalo Higuain – Striker
Just kidding, the Gunners won’t get anyone. (Full disclosure, I am an Arsenal fan). Arsenal is a team, much like the Flyers, that is always connected to huge players, but rarely gets the job done (See: Webber, Shea). To be fair, they did have two big moves in the last two years in Mesut Özil and Alexis Sanchez, so maybe a change in strategy is in the air in north London, but I doubt it (It’s mostly soot and smog in the air in north London). And that’s a bummer, because The Gunners need more defensively, particularly in the midfield, and a higher quality striker if they want to compete with Chelsea. And I don’t know that they’ll end up with either, no less both.

Okay, okay, I can hear everyone yelling at me to shut up. Too much ‘dumb-ass-European-socialist’ talk for one day I guess.

Fine. You can all go back to watching 48 straight hours of ESPN covering whether or not Johnny Manziel took a shit in a hotel sink. I’ll be back next week with a shorter post that doesn’t suck as much as this one did.

*I feel the need now to declare my distaste for Tottenham. When I became a gooner, I was told to hate Tottenham. It took me a while, but the ugly mug of Harry Kane finally did it for me. You’d think he played for a team that could qualify for a Champion League spot the way he acts. Putrid.

 

[pvc_paratheme ]