New Wembley builds a new legend

Keep your eye on the prize!

Believe me, they give off some heat!

It was a momentous week even for Wembley standards. The Venue of Legends staged the world's two biggest club games in three days, then an international.

Nothing, not even the World Cup beats the Champions League Final for quality and now probably, glory as the pride of the Bundesliga, Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund squared up.

A winner now, contrast to a year ago

Dortmund togetherness in defeat

The other big game, measured by sheer prize money was Crystal Palace against Watford for the keys to the Premier League and a £145m boost to the balance sheet.

The Champions League Final gets bigger every year. The switch from midweek to Saturday night takes it into the cultural mainstream. From Saint and Greavsie to Ant and Dec, if you like.

The moment the new champions were crowned

The opening ceremony starring a fully-fledged medieval battle between the red forces of Munich and yellow of Dortmund complete with bow and arrows, was kicked off with West End star, the War Horse.

Honestly, ITV missed a huge trick not broadcasting it in their Saturday night output.

Live flares from Bayern fall on fans below

Instead, they stuck with the foursome of drony Philistines pontificating on the irrelevant "could happen" points. While Adrian Chiles and Roy Keane swapped soundings, the choreography outside was literally marvellous. 

And the game didn't disappoint either. Bayern took their chances where Dortmund didn't and the master unlocker, Arjen Robben set one up and scored the other in the 2-1 win.

So often, this was a textbook demonstration of how to attack against how to defend.

Medieval warfare: the opening ceremony

But in Bayern's win, we're witnessing a change of guard at the top of European football. To win it a year after the disappointment of losing to Chelsea in their own stadium is a mark of a mighty setup. Follow that Pep Guardiola! 

War Horse from the West End 

Palace's win over Watford was more cagey. No one was going to be responsble for triggering tears in the boardroom. As it was, the headlines made were more romantic than the match.

39-year-old Kevin Phillips came off the bench to score the most valuable of his 280 career goals against the club where he made his name in his last game before retirement.

Wilfried Zaha was so often the difference for Palace, with his clever touches on the floor and even brainier short-passing. But Manchester United will observe he needs to build on his game, just as Cristiano Ronaldo needed to in his first days at Old Trafford. 

The semi-final vanquished were Real & Barca

England v Republic of Ireland rounded off the crowded fixture list as the FA's 150th anniversary game commemorated darker days between the two countries. It was the first fixture between the two since that ill-fated night in Dublin where crowd trouble brought the game to a premature end.

Frank Lampard's goal-trail continued. His 29th international strike puts him just one behind Alan Shearer in the all-time scoring parade. Who says the Chelsea midfielder can't go on and score half a dozen more for his country? 

New Wembley is building its legend slowly but surely. It's just seven years old, but the atmosphere, particularly in the two club games was noisy, excitable and befitting the occasions. 

For a modern building, it has a soul.

Thierry Le Cunt Henry, the handball cheat!

Ah, Wikipedia: the democratic doyenne of world enlightenment and knowledge. An Open Source tool giving everyone the ability to update encyclopedia entries immediately. But sometimes, accurate information gives way to emotional outrage.

Thierry Henry's not popular after twice handballing France to victory over the Republic of Ireland to secure a place in the World Cup Finals in South Africa.

Here's his Wikipedia entry. His mum won't be proud of him  :(

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Irish and French football fallout!

The Republic of Ireland play France tomorrow evening. A huge match to decide which one will go forward to next summer's World Cup in South Africa.

If you read any big game preview ahead of this international weekend, it's gotta be this one!

It involves Nicolas Sarkozy, the French President.

Sometimes the anticipation of a game is better than the 90 minutes itself. Whatever happens tomorrow night, this is an example of it!

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Keano: from hottest prospect to journeyman inside twelve months

Roy Keane's Ipswich Town stare up at the rest after yet another defeat, 2-1 at Barnsley.

Rock bottom of the Championship: five points from safety, no league wins eleven games into the season, the board at Portman Road's jittery. A statement offering Keane their full support must be being prepared. The fans of this once-proud club will wonder if the days of Sir Alf Ramsey, Bobby Robson, Arnold Muhren and the Premier League will ever return.

Can we believe this is a team run by Keane? the fearless Irish skipper who seemingly took to management like a duck to water? the selfless Manchester United talisman who steered Sunderland from twenty-third place to the Championship earning promotion to the Premier League? the maturing realist who harnessed his big reputation and experience to attract good players to the Stadium of Light?

What's happened to Keane? the hottest managerial prospect - to Championship journeyman inside twelve months. And we thought the demise of Leeds United was fast.

Clues to his downfall are in the tabloid headlines of yesteryear. To my mind, his walkout as Black Cats boss was akin to Kevin Keegan's tantrum-sponsored resignations. Keano quit because he was in a bad mood for a fortnight.

Describing a narrow victory League Cup victory over Northampton as one of his "worst and longest nights", branding the FIFA Vice-President Jack Warner "a clown" in a row over Dwight Yorke's withdrawal from the Trinidad & Tobago squad and rambling about his future in a post-match interview at Bolton, Keane walked out on his players leaving the club in the relegation zone.

Ipswich would have gone into this appointment with their eyes open - but they only thought of the upside. He's a big name, with a fine playing pedigree, a decent start to his managerial record at the Stadium of Light, a pupil of Brian Clough and Sir Alex Ferguson with an absolute no-compromise attitude to winning.

But he's also the Alfe-Inge Haaland career-ender, the Mick McCarthy disrespector and a man who gets out of the kitchen when he can't stand the heat.

Even fifteen months ago, Keane was talked of as a future Manchester United boss. Not now. When asked, Sir Alex Ferguson's evasive comments about Keane's managerial prospects were withering.

"Young managers come along and people say this one will be England manager or boss of this club, but two years later they're not there. It's not an easy environment to come into, I wouldn't forecast anything."

Keane's greatest moment came in a courageous semi-final appearance in the Champions League at Juventus in 1999. Knowing he was suspended for the Final, he still stood like a man mountain against the Turin side and scored a vital goal to earn United's place in the Final. Maybe, just maybe, his time will come again.

This won't be his last job in the game and indeed if the circumstances are right, you couldn't write Keano off from winning a piece of silverware with a compliant board and adoring fans as a backdrop.

But he'd make a better Shock Jock or Studio Pundit. Keane's managerial career is definitely on a yellow. 

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