Football season starts up!

So its the first weekend of the new football season and I'm satisfied so far. No particularly brilliant games in the SPL or the Barclays Premier League, but my team won their game.

I was most impressed with Blackpool in the Premier League. They were favourites to get relegated from the premiership last year and they got promoted to the top division and won their opening game 4-0. So I thought that was a good opening day result for them, but then again, the Premier League is one of the top football leagues in the world. Burnley had a good start to their season last year and  got relegated after a drop in standards.

Match of the Day 2 is back, but without Adrian Chiles..who did they get to replace him? Colin Murray from Channel 5 or Itv4 or whatever crappy channel he had been on before. I don't have anything against him, just don't like the coverage the channels he has been on has been like... (that makes little to no sense)

And seriously guys, what...is..with the new MotD2 opening? And where did 2 good 2 bad go? That was awesome! =( Its still not very serious the programme, but something about it doesnt seem as good..they are a bit more obssessed over games from the past, clear from the opening and one or two of the videos they showed.

I looked for a video of the new opening, but its a combination of the show only having been on today and a lack of people uploading the openings I think. No luck. Probably a good thing. So heres a video of a 2 good 2 bad from MotD2, damn you bbc/Colin Murray... *shakes fist*

World Cup 2010 Quarter-final predictions

So now that the World cup is just about to go into the quarter final stage, thought I'd do another prediction post.

So for my last one just before the group stages ended, I got 12 out of 16 teams right. Not too bad, there were some upsets that threw me off quite a bit, but I still should've done better as there was only a few games left to play in the group stage at the time I posted.

Anyway now that we know the quarter final teams I'll make some more predictions on who will be making it to the semi-finals. 

World Cup 2010 Quarter-Finals

Netherlands vs Brazil ~ Friday 2nd July. Brazil will win this, but it looks to be a very good match.

Uruguay vs Ghana ~ Friday 2nd July. I'd like Ghana to progress, but I reckon Uruguay will.

Argentina vs Germany ~ Saturday 3rd July. This one is probably hardest to call for me, but I reckon Argentina will win due to their strength in defence as well as going forward.

Paraguay vs Spain ~ Saturday 3rd July. Paraguay didn't impress me much against Japan, then again Spain haven't impressed me overly. Spain will probably win however.

The most impressive teams so far I reckon are Brazil, Argentina and Germany, so I think one of them will go on win the entire competition.

Games resume tomorrow, should be good!

World Cup 2010 predictions

So now that the group stages are coming to an end and we are just over half way through the entire competition, I thought I'd put up some predictions on who will reach the Round of 16. I meant to do this earlier, as I'll have a good idea now that the groups are almost done. Remember these are just my predictions of the top 2 teams in each group. Here are the groups as they stand: LINK

Group A: Mexico - top the group to go through., France - they'll need to win by a fair few goals against. S.Afr, but I reckon they'll come 2nd in group A.

Group B: Argentina, S.Korea - I don't rate Greece much so far, and I really don't see them getting anything against Argentina. S. Korea will beat Nigeria I'd say.

Group C: USA, England. England almost missing out with another draw to Slovenia. (I hope they don't make it though, Slovenia will be the team I hope make it.)

Group D: Germany - topping group D after beating Ghana, Serbia - in 2nd place, tough choice, as Ghana, or Australia could come in 2nd instead. I'd like Ghana to make it through with them.

Group E: Netherlands - easily topping the group (they've already qualified), Japan  - they are really disciplined and I think they will beat Denmark to come in 2nd place here.

Group F: Paraguay, Italy - dissapointing so far, Italy will make it in 2nd place in Group F and improve as the competition goes on.

Group G: Brazil (already through, they will top group), Portugal (will come 2nd despite losing to Brazil, thanks to positive goal difference. Ivory Coast will beat N.Korea in final game)

Group H: this is the hardest for me to predict. I reckon we can say Switzerland will beat Honduras (who looked shaky at times. Although a draw could easily happen in Swi vs Hon) So Switzerland winning would give them 6 points, Spain will beat Chile I think, giving them 6 points. Chile will also have 6 points, so it will all be down to Goal difference. If I have to pick, I'll say Spain go top, Switzerland come in 2nd. Chile are no pushovers though, and I still think Switzerland could be pretty unreliable, and give us a couple terrible performances.

Urgh, as I'm writing this, France go one goal down, so the odds of them going through are dramatically different. Probably more like Uruguay and Mexico will progress from group A. =( 

World Cup 2010 stuff

I meant to put up a post about the world cup earlier than this, but I was away down south for work experience so couldn't really get online. Anyways, no worries..the competition is still going on and there is much to talk about. 

Of course, I'm starting to get a bit sick of the controversy surrounding the both the Jabulani ball used and the vuvuzelas (the horn thing sold for the equivalent of 2 or 3 quid around S.Africa for the tournament.) Tonnes of the teams and press are complaining about these things and everything else. I'd prefer it if they just got on with it, accepted they played sub-par and didn't try to scapegoat people or things like the ball (which they should be used to as they've been practicing with it for a while now.)

I mentioned teams playing sub-par, which has been the main reason I've been dissapointed with the tournament so far. A lot of the big teams expected to do well based on previous form have been really inconsistent. France have drawn and lost T_T, Portugal drew, Spain lost to Switzerland, Germany lost to Serbia and (perhaps best of all for me) England have played 2 and drawn both games against USA and Algeria. Brazil, Holland and Argentina all had slow starts as well so far, even if they did go on to win their games. International football is quite often going to be of lower quality than some club football, because the players don't get many opportunities to play in the international teams throughout the year, and as a result a strong team chemistry probably won't build up as it does in club football. But nonetheless, for big tournaments that only come along every couple years like this I always look forward to them and I don't like being dissapointed. Hopefully things improve as it goes on.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/world_cup_2010/groups_and_teams

As for England, they can't blame the ball, they can't blame the fans, they can't blame the other teams, they can't blame the pressure, they can't blame the goddamn Vuvuzelas, it is the players fault that they have underachieved so far. And I'm loving it, being from Scotland. They can still progress to the next round if they get a grip and play some football. I'll be supporting Slovenia in the next England game. ;D

Rant Mode Turn On!

I dunno...some little, minor stuff really seems to annoy me at times. Like on Ebay, I occasionally buy stuff off there (mostly games) and little things piss me off. Like when I leave feedback for someone and the seller just doesnt bother leaving it for me. Thats not really the main thing though, as its feedback. I mean, the game arrived in a few days and everything, so I'm not entirely bothered about a little positive feedback. Still, if they see themselves as efficient sellers, shouldnt they give out feedback? I can see why they dont necessarily, some sellers might have a lot of transactions to deal with...but still, get with it people!

And other times, stuff hasnt arrived at mine. I've bought whatever items they might have been. Admittedly, I don't think it has really happened in a while, it was mostly back when I used to play CCG's and TCG's like Magic and Yugioh. It was pretty fricken annoying when I spent like a tenner on a card and they hadnt given the option for recorded or insured posting so when it got lost in the post, or they just didnt send it (its a goddamn possibility, and it makes sense) I was £10 and they could actually keep it or sell it again for more profit. So its fuckin things like these that piss me off about ebay, that and the stupid amount of money I end up spending on it. 

If they can change anything about it, sellers should be more flexible, they should offer other options for shipment, just as they do for payment options. 

I've also been getting dissapointed with football, both club (Celtic FC) and country (Scotland), performing badly... I mean, Hapoel Tel Aviv were so bad in the first half...how the hell did they manage to win in the end? Cos Celtic didnt go out and get more goals, and cos they got more and more into the game as a result of Celtic just becoming more slack....

And don't even get me started on Scotland's failure to qualify for World Cup 2010 in South Africa...

Gah..thats enough of minor stuff niggling at my brain like some kind of pestilence. Its not even that it annoys me that much, just slightly. Like this is a minor-rant, or half-rant.

Champions League: The Aftermath..

So Celtic lost their Champions League qualifier against Arsenal last night after 2 frustrating legs of the tie. The first one more or less won it at Celtic Park, with 2 Arsenal away goals which were quite lucky. One late first half free kick, heavily deflected, wrong footed Boruc and one Caldwell own goal later in the game.. =(
I say they were lucky, but Arsenal did have a lot of chances to score at other times, so I guess the constant flowing game and pressure they put on the Celtic defense paid off. Still, it was a hard result to accept for me. If those goals hadn't gone in the 2nd leg would have been there to win. Still, shit happens. Here's a video with some highlights: [Link]

Arsenal 2 - 0 Celtic (Agg 2 - 0) 1st Leg, Final Round Champions League Qualifier, 18.08.09

So that was the first leg, a week ago. The 2nd leg in London proved just as excruciating if not moreso than the first. Early on, a controversial penalty was given to Arsenal. Here's a highlights video: [Link] This to me, and a whole load of other people looked like a complete dive. No contact was really made with Eduardo by Boruc it seemed, yet a pen was given and Eduardo put it away to make it 1-0 on the night and 3-0 on aggregate... It only got worse as the night went on. McDonald scored not long after, but it was ruled offside (which it was. >.<) Arsenal had many more chances throughout the night and it ended up 3-1, Celtic scoring a concelation (sp?) goal with the last kick of the match. Arsenal 3 - 1 Celtic (Agg 5 - 1) 2nd Leg, Final Round Champions League Qualifier, 26.08.09 So there are a few things I thought I'd talk/rant about. (I'll try keep it brief so you don't lose interest) First, the amount of money Arsenal have available for transfers, wages, training etc. Scottish clubs have a lot less money compared to big sides like Arsenal, Man Utd, Barcelona, Real Madrid, AC Milan etc. and this really impacts on the players they can bring to the sides and the progress they can make in the European competitions (Champions League and the now Europa League.) I guess that gulf in spending power and skill really showed over the 2 legs of this Champions League Qualifier, depressing... They had Gordon Strachan in the studio for the first leg analysis during half time and after the game and he talked about this issue as well. It does seem that there really isn't much that can be done about it apart from giving Scottish clubs and other smaller European teams more money. There must be some ways they can even out the playing field a bit, because there is a huge divide it seems. This may seem like me moaning and trying to make excuses but its not, I can accept the defeat and move on, I just wanted to post some football related stuff as I don't do it often. Anyway, now for the core of the rant. You could probably guess it was going to be about the Eduardo penalty. Well yeah, how could I not be pissed off it at? I almost broke a chair when I saw the ref had given it. Watch some highlights or news if you haven't seen it already (I linked earlier on) and you'll see that there wasn't really a lot of contact and Eduardo seemed to go down pretty easy. I really hate that diving or "simulation" as various football commentators have called it is part of the game still so much a part of the game...it doesn't really go in the spirit of the game and I think referees and officials should hand out more punishment for when they don't get tricked by stupid theatrics, yellow cards, red cards-whatever might stop it happening. However, I don't think it should stop there. Nope, thats not enough in some cases. Fair enough in the Celtic Arsenal game last night, it was already 2-0 on aggregate beforehand and this wasn't a tie-breaking decision by any means. In some games though, big decisions by officials really have cost teams badly and I think that should really stop. I said last night, I would accept the result and forget about it as long as Eduardo got punished for his "acting" skills in some way. I wanted a fine or a ban and it seems I'm not the only one who desires this. http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/europe/8223917.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/europe/8208690.stm

SFA chief is calling for UEFA to ban Eduardo for this dive, the articles also talk about video evidence and other stuff.

Anyway, I am running out of time (I need to get to the post office to pick something up.) Now that Champions League football is off the cards for Celtic, the Europa League final qualifying round is the next european fixture, drawn on Friday I think, but I'm not 100% sure on that. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? I'm not sure, on one hand it will mean a lot more fixtures this year if Celtic are to make good progress through the new format for the Uefa Cup (now known as the Europa League) and this could end up tiring the squad out towards the end of the season. On the other hand, we will get a lot more chances to see Celtic playing other European sides, and I love watching European midweek games.

Edit: I just found out here that I was wrong and that Celtic will be going into the Europa League group stages, and not the final qualifier round. The draw is tomorrow, lets hope its a good one! =p

Champions League football.

The 2nd legs of the Champions League semi finals have been and gone now. The Arsenal vs Manchester Utd game was kinda over by about the 8th minute I think it was. Arsenal played about a million miles an hour from the kickoff, thinking they could score, being positive and trying to get some goals. A few defensive mistakes later, and any belief was gone in the Arsenal camp. I would say it ended up being quite a good game to watch, even if it wasnt open for either side, there was some good football played. 

That ended up as Manchester Utd 3-1 Arsenal. (4 - 1 Agg)

Tonight though, there was even more drama. Chelsea looked like they were going through to the final to play Man Utd again (yawn) in the final, after a Michael Essien volley early on. They had kept Barca at bay for so long, even though the spanish side had so much possession, they hadnt translated it to many chances. In the end, the one they did get, it paid off and killed off Chelsea's dreams of being in the final. This took right up till the 93rd minute, where Iniesta struck an equally amazing shot right into the top corner of Cech's goal. Musta been so hard on the Chelsea fans, even more so when they saw that kind of refereeing from this Norwegian(I think) official. To be fair to him, a few of the "penalty" claims didnt look like penalties to me, like the first one, which was just in the box and looked a bit soft. There were a few which could've been given for handball, like the one where Anelka tried to take it around Pique, and it hit his hand. I thought that was ball to hand, as was the Ballack shot and handball, but others would surely disagree, and that coulda been given easily. The Drogba penalty claim was hilarious though, sure there was a shirt-pull in there, but when you act like he did when it wasn't given, you cant be taken seriously. I burst out laughing when I saw his reaction. 

Which was almost as ridiculous as Ballack's protests to the referee after his penalty claim, and even worse, after the game had finished, Drogba's protests to the officials and referee which got him a yellow card. He was complaining, accusing the referee of being a "fucking disgrace." What is definitely disgraceful is the way he acted. There is no place for that kind of behaviour in football, kids could be watching, seeing him as a role model, and thats not going to look good. When Drogba stops being so theatrical, going down looking for penalties and free-kicks and acting like this, he could be an excellent footballer, but as they said on Sky Sports, his reputation is always going to go before him, and right now that is not in his favour. I hope he sees a big suspension for his actions.

Chelsea will probably think they are hard done by, but they cant always blame this kind of result on decisions by referees that didnt go their way. They could have easily put the game away. They didnt play in the first leg, and got no away goals to show for it. They had lots of chances in this game and didnt take any either. They shouldnt rely so much on the officials.

Also, no matter how much it seems something doesnt go their way and how much it infuriates them, I don't like to see Chelsea fans throwing stuff like flags at officials or the Barca bench. You lost, deal with it. Football is harsh sometimes...

Chelsea 1 - 1 Barcelona (1 - 1 Agg) Barca go through as result of away goal.

Champions League Final: Manchester Utd vs Barcelona ~ May 27th, Sky Sports

Link

Link

Football, RPGs, Life

Not really updated recently because life hasn't exactly been too kind to me. I split up with my girlfriend recently, its hard to find a job and my applications to postgraduate degrees have been rejected...but enough moping, you dont wanna hear about my troubles.

I've been watching Champions League football this week and I wasn't too impressed. For semi-finals, I thought they would be more entertaining. Specifically the Chelsea vs Barcelona game. I was looking forward to that game, as I love the football Barca play, but only one team played any decent football in the 90 minutes, and that was the spanish side. I can understand the strategy that Hiddink's men were going for, defending for the away leg and trying not to concede. It worked, but it was a frustrating game to watch. I would have much preferred it if they had gone into the game looking for away goals, would have been a less negative, boring game in the end. 

The Man Utd vs Arsenal game was similar, it was pretty much all one way traffic, with Man Utd bringing the game to Arsenal. Maybe the return legs of these semis will be more interesting. 

I also don't exactly like the fact that the Champions league is so dominated by English teams nowadays...thats why I'm backing Barcelona this year, I don't want another all english final. Man Utd vs Barca could be good. I'm also wanting to watch some more UEFA cup, as I like seeing fresh European clubs in action.

Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga (PS2)

I've been playing quite a bit of Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga on the PS2 recently after beating DQIV. Its the first SMT game I've played (I'm keeping Persona 3 and 4 for later) and so far (I'm only about 8 hours in) I'm liking the visuals and character design, even if everything is very bleak and grey. Gives a really nice cyberpunk feel. Kinda odd that the characters are quite often so androgenous, but thats not too important, I like the cel-shaded way they are rendered. The turn based combat is quite interesting, I'm still getting used to aspects of the whole turn symbol thing, like exploiting enemies weaknesses, critical hits, misses, passing turns and how they affect the turn symbols. I picked the first one up for really cheap preowned (about £6) which might be because the box was a bit damaged, but I was still chuffed with that, I think its worth quite a bit more than that. So, just after starting this one, I ordered the second one in it's collectors edition cos I'm a sucker for limited ed stuff hehe. 

Got it for quite cheap (around £14ish) off Amazon.co.uk and it arrived much quicker than expected. I'll have to  play through the first one and then get on to this asap. I read that you can transfer your save data, which is a nice feature. Only a few minor things about the first game that I don't exactly like so far; the random encounter rate seems a bit unbalanced, slightly too high at times, which can be frustrating when you are running round the large dungeons. Even the first dungeon in the game took me a good while. Comes as quite a shock after playing a game like DQIV with simple dungeons. Some of the monster designs are strange and at first I didn't particularly like them, but they aren't that bad really. The mantra system is one thing I like, but at the same time think it could be tweaked ever so slightly. I like skill trees like that in Diablo 2, and this is similar, but with more to it from what I can tell. You select which mantra you want to follow and you basically gain points towards mastering that mantra. When you get close to mastering and/or do master it, you will gain the skills associated with the mantra. So its pretty cool, but it kinda bugs me when my characters have mastered their mantras and I can't get to a karma temple to assign a new one. So that means any Atma Points (AP) that they get from battle goes to waste until I equip new mantras (which can only be done at certain points in the game) Also, the mantras become increasingly expensive as they get more advanced, this could be a problem but I'm not sure. I'll have to wait and see how much currency I get as the game progresses. Money is rewarded on how quickly, or effectively you beat enemies from what I can tell. They could have easily made it so you can download new mantras through your status screens via the tag ring or whatever that thing is the characters have. Would have been easier. 

I knew I recognised Jinana's voice actress. I looked her up on wikipedia and she had done quite a bit of other stuff, including Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. The game as a whole has a really good voice cast, even though in some bits of the game the lines arent exactly put across amazingly...

Still, some good actors and actresses in the english track. Crispin Freeman (yay Alucard!), Yuri Lowenthal and many others;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Devil_Saga#Voice_Cast 

Other stuff I've found out; Dragon Age Origins will be getting Xbox 360 and PS3 releases! That bodes well for me who doesnt own a good enough PC to run it. I love Bioware, so I'm really looking forward to what has been described as a "spiritual Baldur's Gate 3." If its anywhere near as good as BGII, I'll be happy. I hadn't been keeping an eye on this title because I assumed it would be a PC only game, but this was good to find out! 

Star Ocean: The Last Hope (Xbox 360) has a PAL release date now, and it will be here on June 5th. I thought they would have got this one here quicker, but better late than never I guess. I know the game has had some criticism, but I still want to try it as visually it looks amazing and I've been looking forward to it for ages. Plus the battle system looks really fun. I'm gonna try and get ahold of the second game on the PSP and beat it and hopefully Star Ocean: Till the End of Time (PS2) before I play this one. Yeah, I know this one is a prequel but might as well play them in the order they were released.

I'm also looking to get a hold of Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride, Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles, Riviera, Persona 4. But to be honest, I should really play through some of my backlog.

Too many games...RPGs take a lot of time to play, but hell I love em!