₦airaland Forum

Training resumes monday.

This off-season is taking forever.

As long as "South-East" is a mere geographical expression and is not meant to imply "Igbo", then Rivers State can be part of South East, North Central, North West or phuckever.

icez:
Abu Zaid said the sect members would continue to trail former governors of Borno and Gombe states as well as the Bauchi State governor until they apologise for approving attacks on the Boko Haram sect.

[/b]“We would not relent in our efforts of searching for them until they come out publicly and apologize. They must also distance themselves from this illegal democracy and give unalloyed support towards entrenching Sharia system,” he said.[b]

hehehehe. . . . no wonder former Gombe Governor apologise sharp sharp. Life sweet o!


Abeg we should give them what they want ie their own Sovereign state. . . . Arewa, carry go abeg!

@ Debo, please what was Cahill's record during the "defensive set-up" of Gary Megson?

Andre Villas-Boas: Chelsea's new manager who has dedicated himself to football


Andre Villas-Boas is exceptional. By the terms of his profession he is a prodigy, at 33 becoming the youngest manager to win a European club trophy and doing it in style, with a free-scoring Porto team that caught the covetous eye of a Russian billionaire.

Here is a football obsessive whose geeky adolescent fantasies of managing a football club were realised by a chance encounter with Sir Bobby Robson, the manager of Porto, the club he had supported from the moment he knew what a football club was.

He started doing his coaching badges before most boys of his age had done their A-Levels and was running the British Virgin Islands national team when most his school-mates were graduating from university.

Here is a the privately-educated son of a professor and a descendent of nobility more than holding his own in the grimy world of football. He went from being Robson's protege to Mourinho's spy and has always pushed those around him to match his ambitions: he wants everything fast, including his cars. Chelsea will have to keep up. He doesn't want to grow old in the job, planning to use his career to take him round the world: to Japan, Chile and Argentina.

He might be just 33 but he's crammed a lot into his first three decades. Mourinho once said "it has taken me 15 years to be an overnight success". Apposite in Villas-Boas' case too. There is little that is ordinary about him except, perhaps, his goalkeeping.

Villas-Boas was born in Porto in 1977 into an upper-middle class family who lived in the upmarket neighbourhood running off Avenida Boavista. His father, Professor Luis Filipe, is a chemical engineer who had begun his studies in Portugal before moving to England to do his PhD at in the chemistry faculty of the University of Kent in Canterbury. He now sits on the chemical engineering faculty of the Technical University of Lisbon and works for a company that provides hi-tech aluminium car parts for Volkswagen, Audi, Seat and Skoda. Luis Filipe married Theresa, Andre’s mother, in 1973. She runs her own business, with a number of clothing shops in Porto.

Villas Boas grew up in this affluent family, with two sisters and a brother, and fraternised with the social elite of the city. He attended the prestigious Colegio do Roasario, one of the most expensive private schools in the city and with a reputation for academic excellence. The school had originally been known as the English School, run by Sister Margaret Hennessey, an Irish nun and other members of the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary. The school’s existence was threatened when the state purged religious schools at the beginning of the last century but the nuns kept it going and, while the school is run by a secular board today, the nuns are still in residence.

“He was a polite, affable student but while he was bright he did not study that hard because what really fascinated him was football,” said Jose Eiro, the head of the PE department.

He was obsessed with sport. He was a member of the exclusive English Club, where expats would go to play cricket, polo and tennis, and used their facilities to play squash.

The noble ancestry

Villas-Boas’ paternal great-great-grandfather Jose Joaquim Villas-Boas (1825-1906) was the Baron of Paco de Vieira, an area near Guimaraes north of Porto, and a judge on the Supreme Justice Tribunal. He was also a the civil governor of Braga. His son and Villas-Boas’ great grandfather Jose Gerardo (1863-1913) became the first viscount of Guidhomil, up near the border with Spain. His brother, and Villas-Boas’ great-uncle Alfredo (1860-1926), was the Count of Paco de Vieira, a judge and an influential figure in Portuguese politics under Prime Minister Ernesto Hintze Ribeiro at the turn of the century, working as the minister for Public Works, Commerce and Industry and as the civil governor of Ponta Delgada in the Azores. There is a road named after him in Guimaraes.

Villas-Boas’ grandfather, Goncalo, married an Englishwoman, Margaret Neville Kendall. Her mother’s family, the Burns, were from Lancashire and Merseyside but her father’s family, the Kendalls, had been in Portugal for at least four generations and were most likely connected with the port wine industry (although her grandfather had apparently been the Consul for Chile in Porto). Margaret’s brother Douglas, an Oxford University alumnus, was an RAF wing commander and was awarded an OBE.

The football fanatic

Villas-Boas was enrolled as a member of FC Porto on July 4, 1980, just before his third birthday. It was a prescient move on his parents’ part; he would become a passionate fan of the club. At nine he was part of the family celebrations as they watched Porto beat Bayern Munich in the 1987 European Cup final and he joined a football club called Ribeirense, based in the centre of Porto and the favourite club of the fanatical supporters’ groups. It was there that he first met Fernando ‘Macaco’ Madureira, who went on to become the leader of the Superdragoes, the most influential Porto ultras.

Football consumed him. He started on the ‘gateway drugs’ football magazines and Panini stickers before slipping down the slope into full-blown Championship Manager addiction. This computer game, with its endless statistics, simulated being a football manager and destroyed the social lives of a generation of football geeks.

Villas-Boas was hooked. He used to carry notebooks around with him, in which he scribbled tactical ideas and stats about players and every Monday, the normally reserved ‘Cenourinho’ (Baby Carrot, because of his red hair) would debate with his friends the weekend’s games. “I remember for one school project he handed in an exhaustive report on Porto and their tactics and substitutions with lots of statistics,” said Eiro, his PE teacher.

The footballer

Villas-Boas wanted to play, too. There was a good amateur club near his school called Ramaldense. It was run from a small bar in the neighbourhood and, unlike most clubs, had their own pitch in the city centre, although now, because of financial problems, it lies fallow and is overgrown with weeds. Humberto Coelho, the famous Benfica and Portugal defender, had played for them but when Villas-Boas and a few of his friends joined, the club was struggling. With the first team threatened with relegation from the city amateur league, they hired ‘Spanish’ Quim to coach.

“They wanted me to try to save the club because they were second from bottom,” Quim said. “I needed better players so I went to watch the Under 19 team. There were three players I thought were good for the first team, including a small but aggressive defensive midfield player — that was Villas Boas.

“He had come to the club at 15 from Ribeirense where he had been a goalkeeper. He was not that good in goal so was normally on the bench and would only play three or four games a season. He played one year in goal for Ramaldense then switched to outfield but he would always want to play in goal during training.

“At 18 he was not very big but he was a good player for us. I remember he would always get the ball and then pass to our right forward, Costa. That was how he played. He knew he was not good enough to turn professional, though.” After leaving Ramaldense he moved to Marechel Gomes de Costa, named after an upmarket boulevard in the town, a bit like the Kings’ Road in London. “We were all boys from the same social background who loved football,” explained Pedro Barros, 35, and the club captain. “It as always been quite informal — our office is in the boot of the president’s car. The team has engineers, doctors and students and it was as much about the social side as playing.” He points to the motto on his club T-shirt: “You’ll never drink alone”.

“Andre joined us in 1998 when I was at university. We hadn’t gone to the same school but had mutual friends and I knew him from playing squash against him at the English club.

“He was a good player, not a big guy but wiry, strong and had no fear. We did not play on grass but on earth pitches so tackling was not so easy. He had great stamina. He talked a lot on the pitch – he was already working for Porto by then — and he always took up good tactical positions. He had to quit at the end of the 1998-99 season though because he had more and more work with Porto and he could not get his Saturdays free.”

The crucial meeting

Villas-Boas got his big break in 1994. He was 16 and was living with his parents in what was then new apartment block on Rua Tenente Valadim. Sir Bobby Robson and his wife Elsie lived in the same building. As a fanatical Porto fan, Villas-Boas could not help but confront the manager of his club when he bumped into him, wanting to know why he was not playing the striker Domingos Paciencia (as Braga manager, Villas-Boas’ opposite number in the Europa League final). Sir Bobby obviously liked the boy’s chutzpah and asked him to leave a report in his letterbox. He liked what he read so he asked Villas-Boas to keep writing them for him. He started to take his protégé down to training occasionally to show him how it all worked.

Robson started taking Villas-Boas with him when he went down to Foz, the area of upmarket bars and restaurants at the mouth of the river Douro. Over a meal or coffee, Robson would talk football with his coaching staff and it was there that Villas-Boas first came across Robson’s outspoken interpreter, Jose Mourinho.

After winning the Europa League final in Dublin last season, Villas-Boas made a point of thanking Sir Bobby, grateful for the generosity his mentor had shown. Not only did Robson formalise Villas-Boas’s work by telling Porto to take him on as a youth coach but he also helped him to start getting his coaching badges, persuading the Football Association to let him on to a Lilleshall course even though he was still only 17. He even set him up with a placement at his old club Ipswich Town.

“Sir Bobby phoned me and asked if I could have Andre over and let him watch training and show him how the club worked for a few weeks,” said George Burley, the manager at the time. “He was very enthusiastic and wanted to know everything, especially about tactics. He obviously listened a lot to Bobby and you could tell he’d had a big influence on him. People compare him to Jose Mourinho and there are things about him that are similar but in terms of his love of very attacking football, well that philosophy came from Bobby. If he can combine the organisation of Mourinho and the enthusiasm of Bobby then he will be very good indeed.”

A Scottish Education

Like his siblings and most of his school-friends, Villas-Boas had planned to go to university, and had ambitions of becoming a sports journalist. Then he thought about doing a degree that could help get a job with a club, like Mourinho had done. After meeting Robson, those plans began to change. He plunged straight into getting his coaching licenses, attending courses at the Inverclyde National Sports Centre in Largs.

“Andre first came to us in 1994 was with us here for over 14 years,” said Jim Fleeting, the SFA director of football development. “He did his C, B, A and Pro License with us and was very studious, very dedicated. It must have been daunting coming to a foreign country and being younger than your classmates but he sailed through the courses.

I remember he used to read everything he could get his hands on, books on psychology, physiology.

“He did his Pro License with a great group: Ally McCoist, Ian Durrant, Owen Coyle, Andy Milne and Craig Brewster. They had a great team spirit and he really held his own. He has strong opinions but is always very respectful.

“He finished his Pro License in 2008 and the following year I asked him to come back and give a presentation to the students. He did a club study and a tactical analysis of an international between Scotland and Georgia. I still use his work as an example to present students.”

Caribbean adventure

Villas-Boas wanted to put some of his theories into practice and took the first opportunity, becoming technical director of the British Virgin Islands. “We want to recruit a young coach with the right qualifications,” said Kenrick Grant, who ran the football association.

“He sent us his CV and, coming from a great club like Porto and being a friend of Bobby Robson, we were convinced.

“When he first arrived he was always on the beach, like he was on holiday! But when he started to work he surprised me. He made a plan for all the teams, youth to senior, and had a manual with tactics and training plans, full of information. He was great with computers too.

He started with the youth team and then wanted to train the seniors.

He got some of them coaching the younger players who went on to become internationals so he left a mark. I had an idea about his age but I wasn’t sure.” The association found out that he was 22 only when he left. He had to collaborate with the manager at the time of selection and he wanted complete control, so he returned to Portugal.

Porto Part 1

When Villas-Boas came back from the Caribbean, things began to change quickly. He started working with the Porto youth team again and, in 2002, Mourinho replaced Octavio Machado as manager. “Mourinho asked me if he could ask Andre to work for him and I said ‘of course, no problem’,” said Ilidio Vale, who ran the Porto academy and now coaches the Portugal Under 20 team. “We knew that he had qualities, that he was ambitious.” He started working for Mourinho on a part-time basis for the end of that season and then took the job full time for 2002-03 season, in which Porto won the league and the Uefa Cup. His scouting reports were famously detailed, sometimes taking four days to compile.

He would go undercover to opposition training grounds to judge the mood of the players and assess their fitness before compiling his dossiers and compiling footage on DVDs. Mourinho would call him his “eyes and ears” and took him to Chelsea when he moved there in 2004 and, initially, to Internazionale before Villas-Boas, frustrated at not being given more responsibility went out alone.

Academica

After Villas-Boas stopped working with Mourinho the relationship cooled and he said publicly this season that they no longer speak. He took a risk joining Academica Coimbra in 2009 because they were threatened with relegation but he managed to get them into mid-table.

The club took a chance, too, of course. “Yes it was a risk, but a calculated risk,” said technical director Luis Agostinho. “Through Jose Mourinho we had all the background of his qualities and skills since he first started working for Porto. He was a strong leader who had an excellent training methodology and with a talent for reading matches. You could quickly see he was talented and Sporting Lisbon twice tried to sign him before he went to Porto.” Being younger than some of his players, you might have expected him to keep his distance but he forged close bonds with his players. “His age was never a problem,” said Pedrinho, who played right-back. “Outside of training he was more like a friend, always wanting to know about your family. Another thing that impressed the players was that he was always first to text you or call you if you got injured. If a player went into hospital for an operation, he would be the first visitor. He cared.”

When he left for Porto he sent a text message to every player in the squad which read: “I’m leaving you for a new adventure. I thank you for what we did together. Each one of you has made their mark on me at the start of my career and all in different and special ways.”

His lieutenants

Villas-Boas is bringing two trusted colleagues with him to Chelsea.

Jose Mario Rocha, his fitness trainer, is someone he knows from his time coaching the Porto youth teams while Daniel Sousa does the job — opposition scout — which he himself used to do for Jose Mourinho.

Sousa studied at the Faculty of Sports at the University of Porto under Jose Guilherme, the Professor of Football, who was Villas-Boas’s assistant at Academica. As part of his final-year thesis Sousa interviewed Villas-Boas about strategies for attacking football. A year later Villas-Boas asked the professor who his best student was and he recommended Sousa.

Need for speed

Outside of football Villas-Boas is a big motorsport fan and in March he was invited by FIA vice-president Carlos Barbosa and the Ford M-Sport team to race on one of the stages the day before the Portuguese round of the World Rally Championship in the Algarve. He sat as co-pilot to Matthew Wilson around a 3km test-loop at Loule. “I had no idea what to expect but the speed was just unbelievable,” he said.

Villas-Boas also attended the Monaco Grand Prix this year and enjoys driving his own cars at speed on the mountain roads of Valongo near Porto. He has driven a BMW Z4 and an M5 and these days drives a special version of the Fiat 500 Abarth

Privacy

Despite his privileged background, Villas-Boas has a reputation for being down-to-earth, polite and approachable. He does, though, closely guard the privacy of his family. He no longer gives one-on-one interviews, instead taking after Marcelo Bielsa and Pep Guardiola in giving long press conferences in which he will answer any question put to him. He very rarely appears at public functions with his wife Joana, who studied interior design at Chelsea College of Art, and, since they were married in 2004, they kept well away from Portugal’s lifestyle magazines. The couple lived with their two young daughters in a modern apartment block very close to where he grew up.

His fame, though, is beginning to impinge on his privacy — the first biography — unauthorised, naturally — is about to be published in Portugal.

debosky:
How would you remember when your brain cells are completely degraded? Your daftness knows no limits.  FYI, Bolton kept 3 clean sheets in a row just in February. In fact if we remove a 2-1 defeat at Tottenham they'd have kept 5 clean sheets in a row.

So your mumu self automatically concludes that it means Cahill is a bad defender? How moronic.

The fascination is that despite Ibime's astonishing ignorance, Cahill won more aerial contests than ANY EPL player last season.

What team outside the top 5 (except maybe Fulham) consistently keeps clean sheets? Even if we were to take that stat and use it, it would imply that John Pantsil is a good defender because Fulham keep clean sheets, yet the player has been released by his club.

Your analysis is shallow, ignorant and not worthy of being used as toilet paper.

One of the best eh? So how did one of the best CBs become such a benchwarmer? Ah I see - another excellent player being let go for next to nothing based on the dubiously applied clean sheet stat.

No EPL side is interested, but the almighty Rangers are in for the lad. A glowing recommendation of quality no doubt.  

Abeg go and discuss your ninny wingers with nateevs and stop spewing bollocks here.

Ninja STFU!!!

My friend, listen to me when I tell you about defenders. I was the one who schooled you on how wack Squillaci was when you touted him as a "France International and good addition". 

I told you Koscielny was wack, and I told you that Kolo Toure was a house ninja.

Defence is my game, so leave that to me.


Bolton conceded 67 goals in 2009/2010. 56 goals in 2010/2011.


Villa conceded 48 goals in 2008/2009 (with Cuellar and Laurse at CB), 39 goals in 2009/2010 (with Cuellar at RB) and 59 goals last season which was a stop-start season.

By every defensive measure, Cuellar has performed.

His versatility at playing right-back is to be lauded, and he even looks like a centre back when playing there. He only lost his place as a right-back to that Tottenham boy (who is a better right-back).

Cuellar has never made an error in the Prem, he is always on point.

I never said Cahill is poor, but his defence always concedes. Him and Jagielka fall into the same category. Put a strong fast ninja on him and he will open like the red sea.

I specialise in spotting quality when their price is low for one reason or the other.

I said on Chelsea fan thread that we should swap Terry for Kompany when Citeh came calling. At that time, Kompany was playing as an ineffective defensive midfielder, but I already knew he is one of the best defenders in the World from his time at Anderlecht, albeit his status was depressed due to playing DM at Hamburg at Citeh.

Im an expert at defensive issues. Dont challenge me boy. 

Cuellar is exactly the kind of player Arsenal need. Strong enough, fast enough, with a good mentality. Cahill is not poor, but based on relative value, Cuellar is a vastly superior option right now.

FYI, Cahill kept only 4 clean sheets last season. I dont know where you got 3 clean sheets in a row from. Check FPL.[b] He did not even keep two clean sheets in a row. [/b]NEVER!

Put some strong fast negros on Cahill and he'll wilt. Shebi you remember Stoke vs Bolton semi-final? 


Finally, please tell me which Bolton defenders you had in your FPL team. Abi you want carry last?

Only a mugu would be salivating over purchasing Cahill for £15m.

In all the years Cahill has been playing for Bolton, I dont remember a single game where they kept clean sheet.

Infact, in Fantasy Premierleague, Bolton, Blackpool and Everton are the three teams to avoid for defenders cos they always concede 1 goal.

The fascination with Cahill is that "he looks classy" when playing the ball out of defence.

Na classy we go chop? Give me a rough rugged and raw defender that is ready to take knocks anyday, not a "classy" centreback whose defence always concedes.

I read that Villa have quoted Rangers £3m for Carlos Cuellar.

IMO, Cuellar is one of the best defenders in the Prem. Never loses a physical duel, tall and strong, quick enough, decent passing. . . . and has even shown his versatility by playing right-back.

Most of all, Cuellar was part of the formidable Martin O' Neill defence who were a sure banker for defensive returns in Fantasy footie. Every home game na clean sheet for them, even under Houllier.

Only a maga would be chasing Cahill and Samba for £15m when Cuellar is available for less than £3m.

Reading Arsenal fans comments on this thread, one woulda thunk Samba and Cahill were the only good defenders in the world.

The OP sef is one of those "overpampered" ones, living rent-free in his parents "UK home" till age 25. What would those of us who've been paying rent since age 17 say if this one is complaining?

nateevs:
A few reports stating we are now in the race for Sanchez. The Barca move has broken down, City have offered 40m but Sanchez is quoted as preferring Chelsea with a 36m bid in the pipeline.

Let this be true o Lord!

I trust AVB to buy in the right places especially wings. Xherdan Shaqiri as well please!

How can the Finance Minister sack the the CBN Governor when she came out in support of his reforms?


http://234next.com/csp/cms/sites/Next/Home/5499590-146/story.csp



Okonjo-Iweala supports banking reforms

The Managing Director of the World Bank, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has commended the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Sanusi Lamido, for initiating radical reforms in the banking sector.

She said the banks need strong risk management, but advised that there should be openness and transparency in the sector in order to sustain the reforms.

Mrs Okonjo-Iweala spoke at the weekend during the inaugural graduation ceremony of the African University of Science and Technology (AUST), Abuja whose board she chairs.

“It is a good thing that we are transparent and open about our banking sector. The Central Bank Governor is doing a good job in that area. I think the consolidation of the banking sector was a good thing but now it is time to have a strong supervision and risk management and the CBN Governor is doing it. He is doing a good job, I should say,” she said.

The former finance minister also commended the federal government’s fiscal policy. She said trying to keep deficit down and at the same time spending money as part of a fiscal stimulus is the right thing to do at this point in time.

Monitoring is key

She noted that the key to success is to ensure that the money spent achieve the objectives.

“In terms of our macro-economic management, I think the direction in which the government is going in terms of the fiscal policy, trying to keep the deficit down but at the same time trying to spend money to have a fiscal stimulus because the international economy is not doing well, is also in the right direction,” she said.

“We must see concrete results on the ground with the expenditure and that is the most important thing. So it is up to you, the media and the Nigerian people to monitor that what is there is delivered. It is not only by Ministry of Finance that the delivery should be done. Delivery is from all sectors. The press should monitor all the ministries as well.”

Muki, abeg where can I get bride for 4 dalasi and 25 butut. Me no picky.

@ Kandikane,

So because Preso paid D3m dalassi, everyone must do same? I hope say no be National Cake wey your husband go use pay dowry.

Anyway D250k is less than what I've been charged. I no go respond to the letter cos e be like say de guy get debts wey e want use me clear. I go just send am invite for wedding. If he like make e come, if he like make e no come. Its a free world.

@ Muki,

Thank you jare. Me sef I wonder which kain husband to pay D250k + build house for parents. Na lie o! Unless na Jammeh or Edward Singhateh daughter, I go tell the papa say make him marry hin daughter himself.

^^^ Am familiar enough with the country, trekked all around from Tanje to Ghana Town, Brufut, Barra, Cannifin, Serrekunda et al

kandiikane:
Stop being stingy. .  They don't set it but are pretty much interested in it.
If you are earning about £30k(as nurse) per annum and you plan to marry if you save up you can afford it(This is just for a man earning normal income) but imagine if the man is born into a rich family-to depart with £16,000 is nothing.
I hope my own wedding sef surpass that amount.

I hope you would be coming into marriage with some inheritance not just your bare palms then. If your family can sequestre me a property in Brufut, I wouldnt mind paying £30k for you sef!

Please lemme sign disclaimer that I think Villas Boas is a good manager.

My only bugbear is Romans attitude to spending.

I dont want to come back in 2014 and hear Nateevs claiming that I said Villas Boas is a poor signing.

I never had problem with any teacher. Infact, I prefer the ones who flog cos in my school days, it was a game to see who could take the most floggings. Needless to say, I was the hardest man who could take 100 strokes without flinching.

kandiikane:
There are many rich people in Gambia who can afford it(especially those who have family/parents abroad). . . Its actually about £5,582
250k is really not much

£6000 is not an easy sum to part with regardless of how much you earn. With wedding costs ranging at circa £10k + £6k dowry fee, a man would have to put down £16k just to marry a woman.

kandiikane:
Depending on the person's wealth. . . The girls don't play around

So the girls set the dowry price in Gambia? If my wife tries to charge me dowry herself, I would force her to survive on cabin biscuit for the rest of the marriage.

Emperoh:

You dey complain of Anambra, you don go Imo state? You go sell land for Lasgidi take marry woman for Imo state ooh
You cost no be small. . . .  

As it stands, Imo woman would be looking like a cheap bargain to me right now. You know any Imo woman wey I fit marry? 

kandiikane:
There are many rich people in Gambia who can afford it(especially those who have family/parents abroad). . . Its actually about £5,582
250k is really not much

So una get different price for "home" and "abroad"?

nateevs:
If you want to harp on about Diego, carry on!. However after we talk about Farfan!.

Whats wrong with Farfan? Farfan delivers 10-12 goals per season, similar number of assists and is just as good as any winger at Chelsea, and fits into Chelsea style very well. Very hardworking up and down with work ethic of someone like Luis Valencia. At £8m, he was well-priced whilst Robinho was a £30m flop who would never cut it in the prem.

nateevs:
And yes I stand by my Diego replacement for Lamps argument till simply because you always fail to quote the addendum to the assertion. . . "We have to change our style". .

I feel sorry for the teams who changed their whole style of play to accomodate Diego. . . . Juventus and Wolfsburg for example. . . 

Besides, you dont change style of play overnight, ask Torres. Diego woulda gone the same way as Deco. . . a misfit.

@ Kandikane,

250k dalassi is about £6,250 or N1.8m. I'm surprised many Gambians can afford that in a country where £50 per month is a decent wage.

@ Nateevs,

Shut your trap! Ninny midfielders I referred to were exactly Diego and Moutinho. For you, Diego was your number one choice. The more ninnier the better for you. VDV and Sneijder I said would be alright, but not as a replacement for Lamps. My barbs were aimed mostly at Diego who must play at the point and has no usefulness otherwise. Who are you to tell me about VDV and Sneijder like say you discovered them when as an Ajax fan I've prolly watched them since their debut. My friend you better stick to your Robinho and Diego stories and stop talking megedefegede here. What can you tell me about VDV and Sneijder? Was I not the one who told you why Real were unhappy with Sneider ie, his girlfriend had left him and he was depressed and gaining weight, not putting effort in training etc. There is no player in footie you can tell me about hombre, I know every detail.

And Moutinho has been poor at Sporting for 2 seasons at least, hence he missed out on 2010 WC whilst Sporting finish midtable. If Moutinho had been sold to a British club, he woulda been sold for £7m, not the £9m he was sold to rivals Porto for. According to you, he was a direct replacement for Lampard. Replacement for who? Please google his goals and assists for last season then we talk about replacements. At best he can only compliment Lampard. We had this debate in summer 2008, the following season after which Lamps scored 20 goals and 20 assists and the season after he scored 27 goals and 18 assists. If you had any dignity, during which time Diego (your no1 choice) went from grace to grass. If you had any dignity, you woulda conceded the argument by now instead of colouring the argument in another light. The debate was never whether these are good player but whether they are replacements for Lamps, which they are definitlely NOT. Bros, this is 2011, not 2008. Come with something new abeg.

tom28:
For an igbo girl you have to pay 60 k(sixty thousand naira),20 crates of soft drinks,five herds of cattle,10 kegs of palmwine,10 cartons of beer,a loapard skin,4 boxes of snuff, and an expensive lace for her mom.

I would happily carry this one cos the one wey I hold for my hand pass this one wella.

Welder:
Any ideas on the dowry and Ijaw Cultures?

Ijaw culture varies from village to village and compound to compound. If you want to marry from my family, it will cost you exactly N1.

I just hope these ridiculous transfer rumours following AVB is all media speculation.

Why do Chelsea wait till a player is overvalued before showing interest?

Wesley Sneijder spent all summer 2009 waiting for an interested party before Inter copped him for £13m. Now Chelsea could bid up to £40m for the same player.

Falcao was on the market 2 summers ago for £4m and Liverpool turned their noses up at him, allowing him to go to Porto, when they had been chasing him all summer. Now Chelsea showing interest to the tune of £25m.

Joao Moutinho (poor man's Modric/Valero - and one of Nateevs "Lampard-replacements" flopped in Sporting, was available for £9m last summer, now being quoted at £35m to join Chelsea, in order to do nothing but pass ball in midfield with sum total of 2 goals and 2 assists per season.


One would think Chelsea scouts sit in their office playing with their testicles all day. . . . . or in reality, mad man Roman does what he wants, when he wants. . . with his limited knowledge of footie, whilst the likes of Ron Gourlay dictate transfer policy.

Rice is not indigenous to South Eastern Nigeria. Our ancestors only ate yam, cassava and plantain.

I never thought I could live without rice, but honest to you, I have not eaten rice (or yam or garri) this year. . . . and I am not sick. 

No, not Awka babe. . . I only asked cos I understand Anambra peeps charge the most.

Am just trying to figure out if some people are being greedy or whether their request is perfectly normal, although the subject of my interest is not Nigerian but East African. 

^^ And what would be the case for the whole Igboland, Awka for example? (Dowry + Bridal list)

How much is the going price for dowry these days?

How much would you consider to be exhorbitant?

Whether Igbo, Yoruba, Benin, Ijaw, I wanna know how much the average dowry is in your culture.

@ Nateevs,

I've learned not to ascribe the virtue of "rationality" to Abramovic.

Every decision RA has made at Chelsea has been irrational so don't be surprised if Villas Boas gets sacked after 3 months. Hehehehe.

My main concern is whether Platini is serious about this Financial Fair play thingie cos I don't know how we plan to achieve that after the ridiculous purchase of Torres and the signing of Boas (and all his backroom staff).

My main sore point right now is why Chelsea wanna sign Lukaku and loan Anderlecht De Bruyne when (a.) We already have an overload of strikers and (b.) A severe shortfall of wingers.

Another disconcerting rumour is our interest in £17m rated Eljerio Elia, who I've said several times plays "as the spirit leads" ie like a headless dribbler. That would be the biggest heist in the history of football since the Jules Rimet trophy was stolen.

All I wanna know is why GEJ ratified the appointment of Mary Odili to the supreme court.

Nigeria we hail thee. . .

dayokanu:
A video of the MBGN contestants.

NL girls would start hating on them

Anyone that laughs at them is just hating

@ Dayokanu,

Tell me the truth.

These girls fine for your eye?

Na lie o!

All I see is fake weaves everywhere, and most of them are average.

Ogun state PDP should quickly forward Seun's name for this post. . .