Kashima Antlers have won the J-League championship after a narrow 1-0 away victory over Sapporo. That was enough to keep them ahead of strong finishing Kawasaki - they won 2-0 away at Tokyo Verdi. That victory was enough to send them into a creditable second place, leap-frogging Nagoya who finished with a 0-0 draw away at Oita. Compounding a disappointing end to the season, Urawa Reds were absolutely hammered 6-1 at home by Yokohama F. Marinos.

Tokyo Verdi and Sapporo, beaten by the top two, finish in the bottom two and will be relegated. Iwate, once a powerhouse in the J-League, will have to win a play off to stay in the top division.

Well done Kashima on their 6th league championship!

In front of 22,000 fans, the Asian Champions League holders, Gamba Osaka, were sent back to west Japan after being thumped 4-0 by a lively Kawasaki Frontale at the Todoroki stadium yesterday. Under blue skies, the team from Osaka will be ruing some half chances in the first half. If they had have taken some of them, the game could have had a quite different outcome. However, the home side got the breakthrough on the stroke of half time with Chog Tese, Frontale's North Korean striker, finding the net in front of the disappointed away fans.

The second half saw Kawasaki's players stronger in the tackle and using the width of the pitch to great effect, especially the right side where Juninho (full name, Carlos Alberto Carvalho Dos Anjos Junio!) was causing the Gamba defence all sorts of problems. Deservedly, the Brazilian effectively ended the game with a sweetly taken shot for Kawasaki's third.

Kawasaki move up to third in J-League, behind Kashima and Nagoya, and with two games to go and only three points behind, Frontale are in with a chance.

Here are some words and phrases you can hear on languagecaster's Good, Bad and Ugly section of the podcast - a review of the footballing news. For more English practice check out our worksheets, football glossary and English for football phrases.

• In a row: consecutively

• Aggregate: Total, the added score over two games

• Class act: Someone or something special

• Thrashing: A huge defeat of another team

• Battling: A word to describe a team (or player) that works hard and does not lose easily.

• (a) Thriller: A really exciting game.

• To be Dumped (out of): To be beaten (usually by a smaller team

• To not have a clue: To have no idea, be completely lost

• a Brawl: A huge fight between many people

• a Stand off: When two sets of groups get ready to fight each other

Asian Champions League Winners, four-goal heroes in Spain, Real Madrid dumped out of the Copa del Rey and violence in Bolivian football all feature on this week's the good, the bad and the ugly.

It was good for Japanese side Gamba Osaka as they became the second team from Japan to win the Asian Champions League in a row. They beat Australian side Adelaide 2-0 away to complete a 5-0 aggregate win. Brazilian forward Lucas scored twice in Australia but the real star of the show was Japanese international Yasuhito Endo, a class act.

Good for two top strikers in La Liga last weekend as Higuain from Real Madrid and Eto'o both scored four goals in their sides victories over Malaga and Valladolid respectively. There were slightly differences in that Eto'o scored his four in the first half in a 6-0 thrashing while Higuain's goals came against a battling Malaga side in a 4-3 thriller.

Bad

Manchester United did not have a very good week. They were beaten by Arsenal 2-1 in the Premier League to leave them 8 points behind the leaders and then learned that their English international Owen Hargreaves will be out for the rest of the season with knee trouble.

Pretty bad for Real Madrid too as they were dumped out of the Spanish Cup - Copa del Rey - by lowly third tier side Real Union on the away goals rule and this was despite Raul scoring his 300th goal for the club. Real Manager Bernd Schuster professed to not having a clue why his team were so poor. Problems ahead for Madrid it seems.

Ugly

Problems too for Chelsea star Didier Drogba who on celebrating a goal in last night's Carling Cup match against Burnley threw back a coin that one of the away fans had thrown onto the pitch. Though he apologised the Ivorian striker may face a suspension. Pretty ugly.

Bolivian champions Aurora had to apologise after a huge brawl broke out involving their players and the police last weekend against local rivals Wilstermann. Aurora's goalkeeper used one of the corner flags as a weapon and tear gas had to be used to break up the stand off between the players and police. Ugly indeed! You can see the video here!

Damon increases his lead to a massive 20 points after his 5-4 win last week. This week we have games from the Premier League, Serie A's Rome derby, the Bundesliga, Ligue 1, the Dutch Eredivisie. In addition, we have World Cup qualifiers from Asia and Central America, as well as two international friendlies, including Diego Maradona's debut as Argentina manager. Phew!

If West ham aren't careful they will be tip-toeing their way to the Championship. Maybe Curbs saw the looming credit crunch coming that has knocked the Hammers for six, and did a runner. We should have seen it coming. The squad was "trimmed" in the close season in an attempt to cut costs. West Ham are owned by an Icelandic banking consortium which have gone as bust as "XL" the club sponsor. I'm hearing rumours that we will need to sell more players in the January tranfer window. We have gone on a long losing run, have a new inexperienced manager, a list of chronically injured players, become a selling club and with a potential  pound 30 million fine for the Tevez affair, things are not looking good.

On this week's show we take a look back at the fantastic Barcelona side of the early 1990s under Johan Cruyff's management, the Dream Team.

Worksheet Podcast 13

• Review the football news in the Good, the Bad and the Ugly


• Introduce a new football expression in English for Football

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• And continue the predictions battle in the predictions competition

• ** New Feature ** Football glossary (a huge collection of football vocabulary, technical terms, cliches and football phrases)


• Worksheets and transcripts


• Vocabulary lists

Barcelona currently sit on top of the Spanish league after yet another fantastic performance - this time away at Malaga - to record their 8th win in a row. The style of football being played is superb with players such as Messi, Iniesta, Xavi and Bojan all starring week in week out. They are being compared to the great Barcelona Dream Team of the early nineties which is apt as current coach Pep Guardiola was a key member of that side.

Johan Cruyff, the Dutch superstar and the inspiration for the Catalan's side's title win of 1974 was appointed manager in 1988 in an attempt to turn the club's fortunes around. At that time there was only one side in Spain and that was Real Madrid who thanks to Butragueno, Michel, Martin Vasquez and Hugo Sanchez dominated La Liga with five titles in a row from 1986 - 1990.

But Cruyff did not just want to regain the title from Madrid he wanted to do it in style and so he decided to build his team around a young local play maker Pep Guardiola. He became the heart of the Catalan side and alongside other wonderfully gifted passers of the ball, Amor, Bakero, Beguiristain, and Eusebio, they started to threaten Madrid's dominance. There was still some work to do however to finalise the team and at a time when European clubs were only allowed two, and then three, overseas players, each team had to choose carefully. And Cruyff struck gold. First with Dutch sweeper Ronald Koeman and then Danish superstar Michael Laudrup. Later Bulgarian Hristo Stoichkov and Brazilian forward Romario also had very successful spells at the club.

They won four titles in a row, scored loads of goals in doing so and won the hearts of neutral fans everywhere with their slick passing game and attacking mentality. They also won the club's first ever European Cup in 1992 thanks to Ronald Koeman's free kick against Sampdoria at Wembley while the only down side was that they did not win another. Indeed, they were thrashed 4-0 by AC Milan in the 1994 final which signalled the end of Cruyff's reign.

Is this side the new Dream Team? Guardiola says no but if they keep playing the way they are then who knows, maybe Dream Team 2 will dominate Spanish and European football for the next few years. Let's hope so.

A couple of the biggest derbies in the world feature on this week's predictions. Plus we've got big rivals going toe to toe in the Premier League, top of the table clashes in Brazil and Italy, a big game in the Bundesliga, and the decider in the Asian Champions League.

Here are some words and phrases you can hear on languagecaster's Good, Bad and Ugly section of the podcast - a review of the footballing news. For more English practice check out our worksheets, football glossary and English for football phrases.

• Statue: a representation or copy of (usually) a person in stone, metal or wood

• Outspoken: speaking directly, not hiding criticism

• On the trot: one after another, in succession, a series of

• Throw away: Usually, you throw away rubbish / garbage because you don't want it, but when you throw away a football game, it means that you wasted a chance, you could have won but poor play meant you did not.

• Petulant: childish, sulky, bad-tempered

• Trounce: beat by a large number of goals, thrash, hammer

• Have it all to do: have a lot of work to do, have a big challenge, be in a difficult situation

• Spit: to eject saliva from the mouth, often when you are angry or as a sign of disrespect

• Erupt: explode violently, boil over, suddenly happen

• Dissent: disagreement, protest at, challenge, refusal to accept a decision

Brian Clough, Alessandro Del Piero, Gamba Osaka and the craziest sending off you'll ever see all feature on this week's the good, the bad and the ugly.

The Good

Brian Clough, or Cloughie to most English football fans, is to get a statue put up in his honour in the centre of Nottingham. The outspoken and colourful coach (here are some great quotes), most famously of Derby and Nottingham Forest, won two European Cups with Forest and won the Championship with both clubs. He passed away in 2004. He played for England twice but was ignored for the England job, the statue is a fitting tribute to a great manager from the English game. Very good indeed.

It has been good for Alessandro Del Piero as the Juventus forward scored two great goals against Spanish giants Real Madrid in the Champions League. Having scored a wonder goal against the Spanish side two weeks ago it seems that Del Piero is on a roll. Much like his club team Juventus who have now won five on the trot. Good for them indeed.

The Bad

Talking of the Champions League it was not so good for Australian side Adelaide as they were thrashed 0-3 in the first leg of the Asian Champions League final against Gamba Osaka from Japan. They were completely outplayed and will have it all to do in the second leg next week if they wish to become the first ever Australian champions of Asia. You can see the highlights of the first leg here.

Well, it's been pretty bad for Arsenal recently. Let's just review what's been going on. They threw away the game at home against derby rivals Tottenham, eventually drawing 4-4. That was followed by a loss at Stoke, Premier League newcomers. The Gunners went down limply 2-1. In that game Van Persie was sent off for a petulant shove on the Stoke goalie, Sorensen, and Adebayor and Walcott picked up injuries and were stretchered off. And at home in the Champions League they were toothless in a 0-0 draw with Turkish side Fernabache: this is the side they trounced 5-2 in Turkey. Next up, Manchester United! Bad for the Londoners.

The Ugly

Spitting happens on the football pitch a lot, but usually a player is spitting on the ground not at another player. Barcelona and Argentina's Lionel Messi has been caught on camera spitting at Malaga's Duda. Messi! We want to see your beautiful side, not this ugly one!

The Copa Sudamericana continues to make the headlines for all the wrong reasons as yet again a match involving Brazilian and Argentinian sides erupted into violence. This time it was Botafogo and Estudiantes in the quarter-final second leg match. Brazilian defender Andre Luis was then sent off for grabbing the referee's yellow card from his pocket and waving it at him in clear dissent. He had to be pushed off the field by his own players. Crazy stuff from Andre Luis and the video can be seen here.