FOOTBALL PICSPAM

EUROPA LEAGUE QUARTER-FINALS FIRST LEG RESULTS

Sporting (Lisbon) 2-1 Metalist (Kharkiv)
AZ Alkmaar 2-1 Valencia
Schalke 2-4 Athletic (Bilbao)
Atletico (Madrid) 2-1 Hannover

ALL teams except AZ (whom I don't know much about) are favourite teams of mine, the Europa tournament notwithstanding. Therefore it's hard to see some of them not do well (Schalke, especially). But in an interview I watched with Schalke before the match, it seemed that they were a little too confident. When one of the players said he thought they would have no trouble winning, I *facepalmed*. You never, ever say anything like that before as important a game as a quarter-final. That's what Manchester City did to Sporting Lisbon in the Round of 16 and look what happened to them! Schalke was not at all wise to underestimate the giant-killers Athletic Club Bilbao, who knocked off Manchester United without any problem.

Anyway, I think that anything could happen. Except that I believe Schalke now has no chance against Athletic in Bilbao. Sporting is a very strong team, IMO, but they have to play the next leg in the Ukraine. However, I think they will prevail. Valencia has a good chance back home at the Mestalla and should go through. Athletic should go through. The most up-in-the air should be the Hannover vs Atletico Madrid one, because Atleti has to play in Germany. If they can score an away goal and keep Hannover from scoring two, they will go through. But it could be tough because Hannover is also a very good team. The next leg will be extremely exciting.

And now for the picspam...

One of the funniest comes from Sporting vs Metalist:



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FOOTBALL PICSPAM - CONCACAF OLYMPIC QUALIFIERS

Tonight the semifinal matches will take place to determine the two teams to advance to the Olympics this summer. This is very important to me because until recently Canada has always been an underperformer. But now we have a really good group of young players (most in this team are 17 and 18 year olds vs Mexico's over-20 players) and they have achieved a lot in coming so far in this competition. Kudos to them, though they WILL go down tonight to the powerhouse Mexicans. Mexico is just too strong. Having won the U-17 World Cup last summer, coming 3rd in the Copa America, winning the Gold Cup and even coming off a strong performance in the 2010 World Cup, they are just too strong to lose. Mexico also has a policy of letting their younger players play professionally in the league. (We do that too on a smaller scale. Two of the young Canadian players are with TFC and another plays for the Vancouver Whitecaps in the MLS.)

Okay, so here are tonight's matches. The winners will go to the Olympics. The "final" tomorrow will be played just as a friendly, since it doesn't mean anything.

#1 - 6:00 PM EST
El Salvador vs Honduras

#2 - 9:00 PM
Mexico vs Canada

This from Canada's last match vs Cuba:



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FOOTBALL PICSPAM - MORE CANADA

LOL - As if you aren't sick of us already. But the OTHER amazing Canadian result so far is in the CONCACAF Champions League, our own North and Central American (and Caribbean Nations) version of the European Champions League.

The first leg of the semi-finals has taken place this week. The second leg will take place on April 5th.

Results from March 28th:

Toronto FC 1-1 Santos Laguna (A really good result because TFC did not let Santos dominate.)

Monterrey 3-0 Pumas UNAM

The AMAZING thing is that Toronto is the ONLY non-Mexican team in the semi-finals, from ALL the teams in the MLS! All three of the other remaining teams are Mexican!

From TFC vs Santos:



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