Image posted by the great Benit in the OleOle graphics forum. I thought I'd share it to those of you who are non-graphics forum browsers. It's hilarious, and a bit harsh for Michael Ballack. But hey, the truth hurts.

"I live in luxury. I have so many choices for the team that sometimes I don't know what to do, that's my problem." That's what Van Basten said, who will take advantage of the chance in the last game of the group to rest most of the players in the starting 11, and to test the rest of the squad. 

"I won't risk a possible injury caused by fatigue or to leave myself without a player because of bookings. Also, who is not 100% fit will not play against Romania," said Marco Van Basten to the Dutch journalists. 

These are the possible 10 players that will be rested:

Van der Sar - he is 37 years old and has played 52 games this season.
Boulahrouz - often injured and he just played 6 games at Sevilla and the fitness level is showing.
Ooijer - has a yellow card from France and could risk suspension.
Van Bronckhorst - the left defender who is 33 years old and played 45 games this season will probably be rested after the tiring sprints against France and Italy.
De Jong - he has a yellow card from the Italy game.
Van der Vaart - he is also fatigued after 54 games this season and he ran 21.16 km at Euro so far.
Sneijder - Sneijder had a long season with Real Madrid and gathered 50 games. He also ran 21 km at this Euro and is the key player for Holland and can't risk injury.
Van Nistelrooy - he came back in april after a month of absence caused by an operation on his ankle. Van Basten doesn't want to risk injury.
Robben - he is not 100% and the doctors don't want him to push it and risk another injury.
Van Persie - after two months of absence, it is unlikely that Van Basten will risk an injury on him this game that doesn't do anything for Holland. 

Taking these into account, the possible lineup could be: 

GK: Stekelenburg
DF: Melchiot, Heitinga, Bouma, De Cler
MF: De Zeeuw, Engelaar, Kuyt, Afellay
FW: Huntelaar, Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink

Insiders from the Dutch setup said that if Italy and France were eliminated, the Dutch would "rid themselves of two forces of global football, which could come back to form any time. They would avoid the probability of meeting one of them again in semi-finals."

Van Basten suggested the same thing. He was asked about the game tuesday. He said laughing that he is "interested to be first in the group." The reporter shouted back "you already are!" To which Van Basten said: "Oh really? I didn't think of this scenario. I will do that and we will choose the best possible path for ourselves." 

He also said that it's not their ambition to "lose games, but we will reflect seriously on what is best for us, not for other teams."

Chivu said in an interview for the International Herald Tribune that "it won't change much. The other 11 players will be wanting to show off their skills." I think that's just politics though. 

Also the comments of Cosmin Contra in the same article put a smile on my face for once. He said that "we are a good team. We have two draws against the most powerful teams in the world. We need to attack (against the Netherlands). We need to go hard against them."

Before the Italy game, he said he wanted to sit back and defend. I'm happy he's changed his mind after seeing what a bit of attack can do for us against these big teams. They're not used to small teams attacking them, they're always shell shocked. 

Ciprian Marica is supposed to start for Romania as the striker in the Netherlands game. He is over his injuries, and Daniel Niculae will be rested after the hard work against France and Italy. He should add a different dynamic to the game for us, him and Niculae are very different players. 

Well this is looking good for us so far. Of corse, the Dutch substitutes are good players, but we did beat them 1-0 and drew 0-0 in qualifying and they weren't playing backups. People say that the backups will play hard to get a chance in the first team and show what they can do. But they have to think in their minds that the starting 11 Van Basten used against France and Italy beat the world champions and the vice-world champions 3-0 and 4-1, so even a good game against Romania probably won't convince Van Basten to include them in the starting 11. I think the Dutch will see this as a holiday, and prepare for their game against Russia or Sweden. They'll get their chance to play the starting 11 against us after we beat Spain. 

Either way, I truly believe that France and Italy will draw anyways. And if that happens, I really don't think we'll lose 3-0 against the Dutch reserves, so we'd still move on. But we need the win to guarantee that we can move on. 

I'll be back with more as soon as I have more information, until then, ROMANIIIAAA ROMANIIIAA OLE OLE OLEEEEE. 

Roberto Calderoli, the minister of reforms in the Italian Government was asked in an interview on La Stampa if the game tomorrow between Italy and Romania has political implications. The hostile and slightly inhumane treatement of romanian "gypsies" being paid back by a Romanian victory. 

Calderoli responded ironically: "if we'll lose against Romania, we'll pas a decree by which their win will be canceled morally."

What an absolute wanker.

MESSAGE TO EUROPE: DON'T UNDERESTIMATE US.

It's about the time when I begin to get really excited. I've been waiting for this for the past eight years and I have a feeling I'm not the only one. There will be 23 million people wearing yellow this coming Monday for the Romania - France game, hoping and expecting that some kind of miracle can happen and that Romania might be able to defeat les Bleus, the world finalists just two years ago. 

Nobody expects Romania to do anything this Euro. We're in "The Group of Death," the impossible group that only Italy, France or Holland could move on from.  There are two options for Romania this final tournament: either we surprise everyone from the beginning and keep surprising until we move out of the group stages and then fail under pressure later on, or we don't surprise anyone and we fail under pressure from the beginning. There is no middle ground with Romania, and a middle ground should never be expected. Either we shock the hell out of every betting man, or we make them happy. 

Point: Romania 1994

In 1994 the situation was very similar to the one we're faced with now - very tough opponents in our group, and no one expected us to do anything at all. What came out of WC94 was completely positive - victories against Colombia and Argentina, and a good run until we completely blundered it against Sweden and then lost it in penalties - a game we had in our hand. 

Point: France sucks. 

I don't see the justification for all of the big hype for the French.. I really don't. This is a team that didn't even deserve to qualify after Scotland wiped the floor with them twice in the groups. They have performed terribly in their friendlies and with all of their big name stars, managed to do fuck all in terms of scoring. Their highest scorers in the pre-Euro friendlies were Gomis (2 goals) and Ribery (2 goals, both penalties). Gomis won't play (at least against Romania), so there goes half of their attacking productivity. Their performance through all these friendlies was terrible, boring, and unproductive. Romania will need to take advantage of this.

France also has more than a hand full of players that are in the squad just because they are French glories, and not because they are in top form or will make enough impact. With them in there, surprises are always possible, but the chances are that it will work in our favor more than against our favor. 

Here are the significant games registered by France since the world cup:

France 3-1 Italy
France 0-0 Italy
France 0-1 Scotland
France 0-1 Scotland
France 2-2 Ukraine
France 2-0 Ukraine
France 1-0 England
France 2-0 Ecuador
France 0-0 Paraguay
France 1-0 Colombia

They've played one team qualified to Euro 2008, drew once and won once against Italy. They've been beaten twice by Scotland, home and away, drew and beat Ukraine, won the England friendly in an awful game with a penalty, and then struggled to barely beat and draw second-tier South American teams. 

Here are the significant games registered by Romania in the past two years:

Romania 2-0 Czech Republic
Romania 1-0 Spain
Romania 1-3 Germany
Romania 0-0 Holland
Romania 1-0 Holland
Romania 2-0 Turkey
Romania 3-0 Russia
Romania 4-0 Muntenegro

We've played against 6 teams qualified to Euro since 2006 and we've lost to one of them (Germany). However, I could excuse this by saying that we played 60 minutes of the game with no main players, and the whole 23 man squad was rolled in the game, the germans having Schweinsteiger and co. still on the pitch at the end of the game while we had our third keeper and a team made of all Romanian League players. But without excuses, we've beaten 5 teams qualified to Euro 2008 in the past two years. We're ready, and we've proven ourselves to be ready. We've scored 9 goals and received 3 goals in games agaisnt teams qualified to EURO 2008. 

If the players remain calm and colected and we play our game, we'll beat France and beat them soundly. There is an interesting tactic prepared by Piturca for the France game. Chivu will play Defensive midfield on the left side - tracking Ribery. Daniel Niculae could start the game due to the fact that he plays in Ligue 1 and is in great form. Banel Nicolita could be in the starting 11 to contain the speed of Abidal. 

Point: Injuries

Henry and Ribery have injury concerns. Vieira is just recovering from an injury. All three are said to start the game even if not 100% fit. All I have to say is thank you Colombia!

Point: Sagnol + Thuram

What makes me laugh most is the French defense. We have Mutu attacking the left side against Sagnol and Thuram. I can't wait to see this. It might be the sole reason that we win the game. We play an attacking trident, and if they give too much attention to Mutu since I doubt Sagnol can handle him alone, then openings will appear in the center of the defense. 

Point: Adrian Mutu #10

I don't care what anyone says, France don't have anyone like Mutu on the team. Since Zidane retired, there is no Mutu figure in the french squad.  He'll have more impact than the whole 4 attacking French players, because for Romania, Mutu plays all those positions. Makelele won't breathe this hard ever again.

I'll follow up with more information about this match, pre-game, during game, and post-game analysis here following Romania from every angle possible.

Everything is possible. My guess: Romania 2-1 France. 

Once more, FIFA manage to annoy me. This time dealing with Romanian player Adrian Mutu. Apparently, FIFA want Mutu to pay Chelsea 12 million euros as compensation for the cocaine incident. This is possible only with the Premier League ruling that said that following Mutu's failed drug test, he unilaterally voided the contract with Chelsea. But that ruling only happened because Chelsea wanted the contracted voided in the first place. 

Chelsea didn't have to let Mutu go. Manchester United didn't let Ferdinand go free of contract when he missed his drug test and received one month MORE than mutu in suspension and a similar fee. Chelsea said they don't condone this kind of behavior and therefore can't allow Adrian to be part of the Chelsea organization any longer. So they did everything possible to place the blame on Mutu for their release at the time.

Now FIFA expect him to pay 12 million euros for something that he didn't want to do - leave Chelsea. He was forced out instead of waiting a 7 month suspension and playing again or being sold, and now they want compensation. It's total crap and another reason to hate Chelsea. And FIFA ruling in favor of Chelsea on this case is even more annoying. They have their own interests, and not the interests of the players in mind. Crap umbrella organization. 

I hope he gets a better lawyer and keeps fighting this. It would be a shame if not.

I was about to go to sleep and then read in interesting blog article here on OleOle. And frankly it got me thinking a tiny bit and then made me write this post.

So money in football, good or bad? That's the main question. The aforementioned blogger things it's ruined football, and I think it's done quite the opposite.

When you think about football you have to think of it as an economy -the football economy - driven by the football business enterprise.  Being the sport with by far the largest audience (2 billion people roughly), there is a lot of money involved and a lot of development. Everything is about money... war, religion, welfare programs, and even charity - because either you pay money to charity or volunteer your time (which means you can afford to take time off from working.. I mean.. do you see the mine workers in Africa volunteering at their local food bank?).

So understanding that everything is about money is essential. Then comes what ideas you have about how economies work and what the best approach would be. The way it's working right now is through sort of a trickle down - free market system. And I'll go into why I think that's working in a bit.

I never like the arguments that certain clubs have monopolized football. If there really was one true monopoly in the football industry, then we'd have only one champion every year of everything, and football would get really boring. The fact that teams fluctuate so much eliminates the possibility of even considering that any one team has an absolute monopoly. Then comes the argument that the top clubs have some kid of cartel formed, where they just dominate. But that doesn't explain how come every season there is the surprise team breaking through, and they haven't spent more money than a team they place above in the league. 

Big clubs with big bank accounts help smaller clubs more than they hurt them by "dominating". It's no coincidence that there are by far more professional footballers now than there were 50 years ago. Money that has been pumped into big teams has been spent towards transfers, stadiums, youth systems, academies, tournaments. Teams are making their living and growing because big clubs pay them money for talent they grow. The money they get, they invest in better facilities, higher paychecks, more youth, etc. For some teams it pays off, for others it does not. 

Manchester United spent the money they won from Champions League revenue and the money they got for winning the league on all their transfers. The money they spent was earned through performance, and they received so much money because WE watch their games and see the advertisements, WE go to their stadiums for the matches, and WE buy their merch. Once clubs mature and profit like United has, they invest only money they win. And that's all they need to invest to maintain or add some youth. They don't spend 100 million extra to buy one super expensive player that they don't really need.

Think how much Tottenham have stimulated the football market in the past few years. They've paid high prices for crap players and they've won nothing (well some cup) and they're just abosulte shit. But the prices they paid helped other teams, and in turn that money helped other teams and so on. 

The money invested helps the global football business grow, expand, and frankly employ more people and raise standards. We have a faster game, more exciting, and with more attention than ever before. And we still don't have a monopoly!

I can tell you when I did see a monopoly in football - during communism in Romania, at the peak in 86. No one was allowed to invest in any clubs, they were run by government organizations. The organization with the biggest budget was the Military, and their team was Steaua. They won basically every season, league and cup. And one season they won the Champions League too, with no foreign players. But they completely monopolized football in Romania and there was no money invested to make any kind of difference, making our league pure crap after those years. And we're still recovering from that now. Finally through investment and good management, a small team broke through the ranks and won the league - CFR Cluj. They spent far less money than Steaua, they spent much less time match fixing and hiring referees, but then won the league. And that to me makes a big statement. 

When you have any kind of control and you don't allow the market to do it's job and allow a freedom of flow of money through the system you can't expect progress. You might have some for a short time, but then it all starts to snowball. Money makes people want to do things... like continue playing football, because it pays as well or better than working on a farm, cleaning shit off of toilets, or for a group of footballers, it pays better than managing a big company or being a doctor.

My last example is Arsenal, who spend very little money compared to other big teams in the Premiership, and continue to do well. They don't win the league every season, but they might be able to dominate for the next few years if they can keep their players - WITH MONEY! And with Hleb, Flamini etc. leaving, it's just another bit of proof that it's hard to monopolize football even if you have a completely created team and not a bunch of 50 million dollar superstars. Barcelona are suffering from the "too many superstar" syndrome. And they're changing their ways, selling players, promoting youth, etc. 

But in the end, football has benefited from influx of money over the years. The rise of Eastern European leagues for example is due to money being invested. You've seen Romanian and Bulgarian teams in the Champions League groups for the past few seasons (though they didn't do very well.. but still..) and they were there because  of money. The industries in these countries are growing in terms of football, and it will just give more and more young kids the opportunity to play an amazing game and maybe make a living out of it and entertain us. 

Football sales and industry in Brazil also represents the amount of GDP that it cost to switch from oil to ethanol as their fuel. Eliminate the money in football in Brazil, and you would not have an energy-independent nation. Think about that for an impact.

Plus, if there wasn't so much money in football, you wouldn't have places like OleOle... and that would be no fun. ;)