End of Season Awards

[cheesy bites]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2011/may/24/guardian-writers-awards-premier-league

So the Guardian have posted their thoughts about some awards for the season. What do you guys think?

Best goal
Best match
Best player
Best manager
Best signing
Biggest flop
Best pundit
Main gripe
Change I'd like to see for next season
Is it the best league in the world?

Best goal - Rooney's overhead goal, it was pure magic
Best match - In terms of a spectacle, probably the Newcastle Arsenal 4-4 game
Best player - Nemanja Vidic, an absolute monster of a defender
Best manager - Beyond SAF, has to be Ian Holloway
Best signing - VDV comes close, but Chicharito has been so so good
Biggest flop - Torres edges out Joe Cole purely due to transfer fees
Best pundit - Souness, you can tell he knows his stuff and shows no bias
Main gripe - Overreaction by the media (Rooney leaving, Arsenal title chance, Bale)
Change I'd like to see for next season - Some form of a wage and/or transfer limit
Is it the best league in the world? - Yes. Spain has two good teams, we've got loads

[Boss]

Agree with your thoughts, although:

Best goal - Berbatov v Liverpool
Best player - Carlos Tevez
Best manager - if we ignore SAF, Dalglish has to be up there for the turnaround

[Flavs]

Best goal - Beckford vs chelsea
Best player - Yaya
Best manager - Holloway

[adzzzbatch]

We could have our own end of season awards:

Biggest individual fuck up award
Biggest team fuck up award
Player who is the biggest waste of space award

You get the idea.

[Flavs]

We could have our own end of season awards:

Biggest individual fuck up award
Biggest team fuck up award
Player who is the biggest waste of space award

You get the idea.

Chin up goth

[Cripps_orig]

Best comeback (joint award with worst collapse)
Newcastle & Arsenal

When Arsene Wenger's men went into the dressing room in St James' Park 4-0 up at half-time in February they must have thought the job was done and dusted – and they certainly played like they already had been given the three points in a crazy second half.

The Toon fought back with the sort of guts that the Gunners must envy, with Chieck Tiote's wonder strike late on sealing one of the Premier League's all-time greatest comebacks.

It also proved to be the first sign that Arsenal would blow it all. Before that game, the Gunners were five points off the top of the table. After it, Wojciech Szczesny and Laurent Koscielny brilliantly gifted Birmingham the League Cup, then they pathetically failed to take a shot against Barcelona at Camp Nou, just days before they were easily booted out of the FA Cup by a Manchester United side that featured seven (SEVEN!) defenders.

The Gunners were so traumatised after that result at Newcastle that they won only three more Premier League games in the season. Only Arsenal could cock it up so spectacularly.

Best goal
John Pantsil (Fulham vs Liverpool)

In front of the Kop at Anfield, the Ghanaian deftly controlled the ball before flicking it over the keeper and stroking it home. He couldn't believe what he'd done and just stood there, mesmerised by his own brilliance, and put his hands to his head. Except it was in the wrong net, and he'd actually lofted the ball over Mark Schwarzer and given Liverpool the win. What a muppet.

Honourable nods also to Wayne Rooney for his slightly-less-technically-brilliant-than-Pantsil's-wonder-strike overhead kick to win the Manchester derby, Charlie Adam for a host of outstanding free kicks, Johan Elmander for his twisty-turny genius goal at Molineux, Tuncay Sanli for a solo stunner for Stoke against Manchester United, Robin van Persie for capping off the best counterattack of the season against Wolves, and Dirk Kuyt for pinching a wondergoal off Luis Suarez by tapping in after the Uruguayan had beaten four Manchester United defenders in the box before stroking it across the face of goal.

Worst celebration
Wayne Rooney (Manchester United vs West Ham)

The striker proved himself to be a terrible role model (as if the prostitutes, holding his employers to ransom and mouthing off about England fans hadn't already) when he swore directly into the homes of millions of viewers across the world against the Hammers after completing a remarkable comeback at Upton Park.

It was ******* stupid. What a ****.

http://u.goal.com/128100/128113hp2.jpg


Wayne's (mad) world | Striker soon took his anger out on the pitch... by eating it

Worst prediction
Steven Gerrard (Liverpool)

Wrap something around your sides because they're about to burst. Here's what the Reds captain said at the start of the season.

On the new managerial appointment: "It's a great club and after speaking with Roy Hodgson I'm really pleased to see his plans for the club. It's a new era now – we must forget about the horror of what happened last season and get this club back to where it belongs, which is the Champions League at the very least."

On Joe Cole: "Lionel Messi can do some amazing things, but anything he can do Joe can do as well, if not better. He used to shock us in training by doing footy tricks with a golf ball that most players can't even do with a football. I really fancy Joe for the [player of the year] award this season."

Excuse me while I go and change my pants.

Biggest joke
Fifa

On a scale of 1-10 on transparency and political accountability, world football's governing body would have to be rated minus infinity. This season we've had a joke of a World Cup bidding process littered with accusations of bribery and foul play and a presidential election race that turned into a farce when Fifa decided to investigate claims made by Fifa that Fifa was corrupt, with Fifa deciding that Fifa was not corrupt and Fifa continue to be led by Sepp Blatter.

Worst performance of the season
Ray Wilkins (commentating on Real Madrid - Tottenham)

Note to co-commentators everywhere: repeating "stay on your feet" a million times, constantly referring to an English team as "we", ignoring blatant dives by the Premier League team but going mental at the foreigners falling over, and saying that the side who had dominated all game had only just begun to take control at 3-0 up makes for BRILLIANT entertainment.

It was easily the worst display of the season, but it was so bad that it was absolutely hilarious. Wilkins is obviously an intelligent bloke seeing as he's played for some of the best teams in the world and been a key part of a double-winning Chelsea just a year ago, but the best excuse we can offer him is that he forgot to take a hat for his bald head with him to Madrid and got sunstroke.

Best performance of the season
Barcelona against Real Madrid at the Bernabeu

Pedro, Dani Alves and Sergio Busquets all excelled in the first leg of the Champions League semi-final, and are believed to be in the running for next year's Oscars for their theatrics in the Spanish capital.

Best goalkeeper
Nemanja Vidic (Manchester United)

Theo Walcott fired over an inch-perfect cross (probably his one and only of the season) that had 'GOAL' written all over it as it flew towards Robin van Persie to nod home, only for it be diverted by the Serb's outstanding fingertip save.

£20 million on David de Gea? Pfft, Manchester United already have the perfect replacement for Edwin van der Sar.

Biggest motormouth
Ian Holloway (Blackpool)

When is this guy not talking? And when is this guy not talking gobbledygook?

Ian Holloway quote of the season



"You are talking out of your hat. I would like to say out of your ass, but that's a donkey and I don't like having a go at donkeys."



– That's Ollie gold right there.

Best U-turn
Wayne Rooney (Manchester United)

The England striker had the whole football world up in arms after announcing his intention to leave Old Trafford in October because he felt the team could not win things… and then changed his mind a few days later when he was offered a mega new deal worth over £200,000 a week assurances over new players.

A disgraceful episode from the 25-year-old, who publicly held his club to ransom simply to make himself a fortune at a time when he was playing dreadfully.

Quotes of the season



"I met with David Gill last week and he did not give me any of the assurances I was seeking about the future squad. I then told him that I would not be signing a new contract."



- Rooney announces his intention to leave Manchester United




"I said on Wednesday the manager's a genius and it's his belief and support that convinced me to stay."



- Yeah, right, Wayne. We're sure the sound of a few extra thousand pounds dropping into your bank account had more influence than Sir Alex Ferguson.


Shot of the season (joint award with Biggest prat)
Ashley Cole (Chelsea)

The left-back acted like a naughty schoolboy by bringing some toys into training with him, except instead of a slingshot it was an air rifle that the idiot brought in, and he used it to shoot a work experience student, thus re-confirming that he is the most loathsome man in the Premier League.

Best tweeter
Rio Ferdinand (Manchester United)

The England centre-back excelled himself this season. Not on it, but off it, with some fantastic work on Twitter, most notably his Ray Wilkins-inspired 'stay on your feet' campaign, which is still going to this day.

Worst tweeter
Jonjo Shelvey (Liverpool)

The young midfielder and full-time Dr Evil lookalike shot to prominence earlier this year by 'accidentally' posting a picture of his meat and two veg to the social networking site before swiftly having his account deleted. (For those wondering – he's totally bald all over.)

One man who certainly isn't hairless and who only narrowly missed out on this booby prize is Wayne Rooney, who when he isn't challenging his followers to fights or telling the world to follow his thuggish brother because he's got plenty of "banter", is shaving his IQ into his chest.

Worst manager
Roy Hodgson (Liverpool)

Brought in amid much media hype, the former Fulham man was said to be the man to steady the ship after Rafael Benitez's dismissal and Hicks & Gillett's catastrophic ownership. The warning signs should have come the day Woy was gleefully snapped shaking hands with Joe Cole after the club confirmed his signing on a free, which was still a rip off.

It wasn't just the football that was bad under Hodgson, it was the results, the press conferences, the atmosphere, and the astonishingly defeatist attitude (he described a limp loss to Everton as Liverpool's "best performance of the season").

Just imagine what hilariousness would have ensued had the man who signed Paul Konchesky, Christian Poulsen and Cole been in charge when Liverpool recouped £50 million for Fernando Torres in January?

Best manager
Roy Hodgson (West Brom)

"Say whaaaaat?" – you may be asking, but look at what he's done since taking over at The Hawthorns. He's been the exact opposite of the imbecile who was in charge at Anfield and is loved by the fans, who have been served up some great football and the results to go with it.

Scott Parker came a close second for this award after taking over all the team talks for West Ham, for whom he was so inspirational that he made Carlton Cole cry at half-time prior to a miraculous comeback at West Brom.

http://u.goal.com/111500/111557hp2.jpg


Chins up | Woy wecovewed weally well with West Bwom

Worst player
Jermain Defoe (Tottenham)

Eight months it took this useless sack of spuds to get a league goal. EIGHT MONTHS. A rotting corpse could get a couple of goals from set pieces in the Premier League with the amount of games it took the midget striker to score.

Most ridiculous owners
David Gold & David Sullivan (West Ham)

Hiring Avram Grant was bad enough, but undermining him at every opportunity was even worse. With plenty of games left to ensure the Hammers' survival the pair were mouthing off about the team having no hope, about certain players not caring, and basically kicking the ladder to safety away from underneath the club.

It would be amiss not to mention Roman Abramovich here, who saw fit to sack a double-winning coach despite burdening him with a useless £50m waste of space halfway through the season. Top work, go buy yourself another yacht upon which you can watch your team fail to win the Champions League.

Maddest day
January 31

This column had to check the weather forecast to make sure that hell had not frozen over when the news came through that Liverpool were spending £35m – or three and a half trillion pennies – on an injured binge drinker.

Best transfer
Fernando Torres (Liverpool to Chelsea)

Because the Spaniard's repeated failure to score for three months pretty much wrote Mock the Weekend for me every week.

Worst debut
Wayne Bridge (West Ham)

The former England left-back (how desperate were the Three Lions then, eh?) made the switch to east London in January after spending his time at Manchester City being rubbish and not shaking hands with people.

In his first game, against Arsenal, he played his man onside to score the opener, gave away a penalty for the second before making a hat-trick of defensive stupidity by not closing his opponent down for the third. And yet still only the second most humiliating experience of Wayne Bridge's recent past.

Most honest man
Mick McCarthy (Wolves)

Most managers like to pretend that they're best mates with everyone and defend other bosses to the hilt, but most managers aren't Mick McCarthy.

When asked whether he sympathised with under-fire Aston Villa boss Gerard Houllier, the gruff Yorkshireman replied: "I don't like to hear any manager getting hostility. But I'd prefer it to be him than me so, no, to be honest I don't give a flying flute. I can empathise with him, I've been there, but 'sympathy' is not the word. Look it up in the dictionary, it's between sh*t and syphilis."

Worst Wembley performance
Bolton (at the FA Cup semi-final)

Getting to the prestigious stadium for any event is supposed to be one of the best days of any football fan's life. Not for Bolton, who were 3-0 down to Stoke at half-time and came out for the restart to see that thousands of their supporters had buggered off home. Terrible effort from the Trotters, that.

Biggest letdown
Real Madrid versus Barcelona, Champions League

It was hyped to be the best game of all time, but Mourinho's negative tactics and Barcelona's disgraceful play acting made it about as entertaining and attractive as watching Avram Grant skinny dipping with a manatee.

Best chant
Liverpool fans for "Dalglish, Dalglish, Dalglish, Dalglish, Dalglish, Dalglish, Dalglish, Dalglish, Dalglish, Dalglish"

This hypnotic wave of noise seemed to work as the club's owners soon sacked Roy Hodgson and thawed Kenny Dalglish out of his managerial freezer.

Maybe Arsenal fans could do the same to convince Arsene Wenger to get his finger out by simply chanting: "Spend, spend, spend, spend, spend, spend, spend, spend, spend, spend, spend."

Worst defender
Super Injunction

Bought at great expense by CTB to do one thing and one thing only, this late season signing failed dramatically as the clandestine footballer was left ruthlessly exposed by thousands of Twitter users.

Footballers, for future reference, if you wish to remain anonymous, try playing central midfield against Barcelona in the Champions League final. Or keep it in your trousers. Both would work.

Mock the Season's comedy XI

Heurelho 'Between the legs' Gomes
Gary 'Shameful last three games' Neville
Sol 'Should have retired five years ago' Campbell
Sebastien 'French international, somehow' Squillaci
Paul 'As bad as he is bald' Konchesky
Joe 'Joke Hole' Cole
Lee 'Red card' Cattermole
Eidur 'Too fat for two clubs' Gudjohnsen
Robbie 'Moany, angry, shouty, pointy, rubbish' Keane
Fernando '£50m of absolute tosh' Torres
Michael 'I don't understand why I'm not in the England team even though I'm rubbish' Owen

Manager - Arsene 'We can win the quadruple... We can win the treble... We can win the double... We can win the league... We can finish second... We can finish third... Next year is our year' Wenger





http://u.goal.com/111600/111638_thumb.jpgSuper Mario Balotelli's top five utterly ridiculous moments of the season
5. Not knowing who Jack Wilshere is

Said the striker after he was voted best young Italian: "What's his name? Wil ... ? No, I don't know him, but the next time I play against Arsenal I will keep a close eye on him. Perhaps I can show him the Golden Boy trophy and remind him that I won it."

4. Throwing darts

The former Inter man could have killed someone with this prank, but his rationale behind launching arrows from his hotel room window down at a few youth team players was sound. The 20-year-old was fined two weeks' wages for this mindless act, but told the Manchester City brass that he did it because he was "bored". Fair enough then.

3. Parking his car everywhere and racking up huge fines

The surly sensation made the headlines (again) in April when it was revealed that he has had his car impounded 27 times by Manchester police after notching up an impressive three parking tickets a day since moving to England – making him comfortably the most inconsiderate driver in the Premier League and setting him back £10,000 in fines. That won't bother Super Mario, though, for when the police pulled him over and asked why he had £25,000 in cash on the passenger seat, he simply replied: "Because I can."

2. Giving a bully a lesson

Whether it was a PR stunt or not, there's something endearing about an international football superstar taking a kid to school to sort out a bullying problem. The striker apparently spotted a child playing truant outside City's training compound and took him to see his headmaster and the bully to sort out the problem. It's not his only display of humanity, for he also gave £1,000 to a homeless man after he had a big win at the casino.

1. Winning the FA Cup, then missing the parade

Balotelli showed up in the big Wembley game at Stoke (and celebrated winning by tripping up Yaya Toure and then chasing his team-mates around the pitch with an inflatable banana), but then went AWOL for the party in Manchester despite telling the world of his plans to take his dog on board the bus. Roberto Mancini gave the forward permission to fly back to his homeland for 'family reasons' but the youngster was spotted in Milan… throwing water bombs at Serie A club chiefs and TV cameras.

Note: This list doesn't even include "making a training bib seem like a Rubik's cube". He's genuinely mental.





GOOD SEASON
http://u.goal.com/132300/132338_thumb.jpgSir Alex Ferguson
Despite his belligerent and pointlessly cantankerous ways, you've got to hand it to him: he's well and truly knocked Liverpool off their perch by taking Manchester United to 19 league titles.

Pep Guardiola
Had an operation on his back earlier this year, presumably because he'd fallen over in amazement at how well his team played in the 5-0 win over Real Madrid. He may have lost the Copa del Rey to Jose Mourinho's spawny side, but he then oversaw one of the greatest displays in a Champions League final. Three years, three league titles, two European Cups, one Copa del Rey – one brilliant manager.

Sepp Blatter
A gutless, selfish, backwards, utterly loathsome individual but he gets another stint as Fifa president. Evil genius.BAD SEASON
http://u.goal.com/130200/130235_thumb.jpgJose Mourinho
He may have won the Copa del Rey and he has seen Jorge Valdano sacked as Real Madrid give him free reign, but the Portuguese failed to get close to Barcelona and disgraced the sport (as he did when he hounded Anders Frisk out of the game after a barefaced lie) with his repulsive tactics and attitude before, during and after the Champions League semi-final between the clubs.

Tom Hicks and George Gillett
The least liked Americans since George W. Bush and Dick Cheney finally lost their grip on Liverpool in October, and lost a few hundred million pounds with it too.

Richard Keys and Andy Gray
The faces and voices of Sky Sports' football coverage were forced out after a series of bigoted, bullying and plain stupid comments came to light. They're now found flogging tiles on the radio.

http://www.goal.com/en-gb/news/2896/premier-league/2011/05/30/2508777/mock-the-weekend-end-of-season-awards-the-best-and-the-worst

:lol:

Great read

[The Wengerbabies]

Good read.

Love this bit


Manager - Arsene 'We can win the quadruple... We can win the treble... We can win the double... We can win the league... We can finish second... We can finish third... Next year is our year' Wenger

:lol: :upset: