Spanish La Liga: 2013-2014 season preview

August 17 the day when the 2013-2014 Spanish Liga kick starts. So what to expect from Barcelona, Real Madrid, Atletico, Valencia, and others? The new season should be mouth-watering with the two giants having new coaches. Where will the title go Madrid or Barcelona? The Barcelona fans should be happy to know that they will have two of the best attacking players in the world at the start of the new season. Neymar alongside Messi might sound great but it might take time to work. Neymar will definitely have to adjust his game because Lionel Messi is the star of Barcelona. Messi However needs to understand the way that Neymar plays so that they can be effective together. If they can get an instant chemistry together Barcelona will again win the Spanish La Liga despite all the signings that Real Madrid has made.

Real Madrid has spent 72.5 million to acquire Midfielder Asier Illarramendi from Real Sociedad for a fee of 30m; Midfielder Isco from Malaga for a fee of 30m; Brazilian midfielder Casemiro (permanent signing) from Sao Paulo for a fee of 6m; Defender Daniel Carvajal from Bayer Leverkusen for a fee of 6.5m. It is obvious that there will be a lot of changes at the Santiago Bernabeu the major one is managerial. Carlo Ancelotti has taken up the job after Jose Mourinho ended his tenure with a poor season. Ancelotti has the task of leading the charge for Real to win another La Liga and even maybe the champion league. Isco is fantastic along Mesut Ozil he should be even better so the Los Blancos do have the players to get the job done but the question is What is Ancelotti’s game plan and how best can the players adapt to that? Will he change Real Madrid style of play maybe into more attacking? The questions will be answer around mid-way through the new season. The new face are extremely talented and they will add depth as well as more flair but I think Real should have signed a striker to replace Higuain because he did a lot of the scoring last season and it will be a big gamble to just bank on Ronaldo and Benzema to score the goals and keep in mind we have not seen Benzema reached his full potential as yet so is this the season when he steps up an score atleast 20 goals in a La Liga campaign? This new season could be the start of a long term plan at the club.

For my predictions of Barcelona new season please visit my other blog https://tajsports360.wordpress.com/2013/07/31/quality-up-front-neymar-along-side-leo-messi/

As it relates to third place I think it is wide open and any team could just grab it but expect Atletico Madrid to be the main team fighting for third place. Valencia has a good team so it should be interesting. The new season should be interesting.

 

2013-2014 Bundesliga: Season preview

The 2013-2014 German Bundesliga season got underway on Aug 9 and it is fear to say that the league has made major improvements over the past couple of years. It was quite obvious when you look at the champions league for example the German teams that have qualified had all perform well over the past three seasons. The new season promises to be a great one, don’t expect Bayern Munich to run away with the title this season the competition will be tougher in fact I’m backing Dortmund to nock Bayern off their throne. Before I get into that it is only fear that we identify the prospective winners of the Bundesliga 2013-2014 season.

Bayern Munich are definite favourites to reclaim their title but with a new coach that may not be quite as easy as it was last season. Pep Guardiola has brought in three players for the new campaign Thiago Alcantara from Barcelona for a fee of 25m; Defender Jan Kirchhoff on a free transfer from Mainz; Midfielder Mario Gotze from Dortmund for a fee of 37m. Looking back to last season Bayern Munich hardly had any flaws so therefore Pep’s job is to improve upon the good works that the veteran Jupp Heynckes had started. Pep has to bring his own style to the Allianz Arena. The first bad decision he made was to bring in Thiago and Mario Gotze. The singing of one of them would make a lot of sense but both players not at all. One good thing about that thou it is a clear indication that players will have to fight for their starting berth so the competition will be good for the team but at the end of it all you will have talents wasting. The reality is that Thiago, Gotze, Toni Kroos and Shaqiri all cannot play together at the same that means that players will have to be on the bench. When you look at the potential of these four players and their age it only says one thing that they all are starters or should be. Javi Martinez playing time cannot be limited as he is a brilliant player. They have sold their second best striker in Mario Gomez so the other question is who will do the scoring when Mario Mandzukic is unavailable or just having a bad game? Can they really depend on goals from the midfield? We’ll see!

Another prospective winner is Borussia Dortmund they did well last season making it to the champions league final and all but they were just poor at times in the league and I think that came down to squad rotation because the reality was just that Dortmund did not have a deep enough bench so am sure Jurgen Klopp has identify that he will need to expand his squad so he has brought in Armenian midfielder Henrikh Mkhitaryan from Shakhtar Donetsk for a fee of 27.5m; Gabon forward Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang from Saint-Etienne for a fee of 13m; Goalkeeper Hendrik Bonmann on a free transfer from Rot-Weiss Essen; Greek defender Sokratis Papastathopoulos from Werder Bremen for a fee of 9.5m. These summer transfer will prove to be instrumental. Aubameyang has already score a hat trick in their opening match and expect more from these summer transfer who has a lot of potential. I am backing Dortmund to steel the title from Bayern Munich because they have already shown that they know how to beat Bayern and the host of players that they have brought in means that they can find some amount of stability in the league and I think that will be just enough for them to steel the title. Key thing to note is that Pep is new to the league so there will be times where he will find difficulties because that’s just the nature of football and you can never expect a coach who is new to a league to get it 100% correct so what am basically saying is that Bayern will make their mistake and Klopp will use experience to ensure that he takes full advantage of those opportunities. Expect amazing football from Borussia Dortmund in this new season.

Thats where goes for 1^st and 2^nd in the Bundesliga but who will be fighting for third place?  Bayern Leverkusen has made in my opinion the bolder approach to claim the third spot, so expect them to fight off challenges from Schalke Fc and the other teams that might progress.

The Bundesliga will continue to grow and improve don’t expect that to change anytime soon.

Borussia Dortmund will be crowned champions of Germany for the 2013-2014 season.

French Ligue 1: 2013-2014 season Preview

The French Ligue 1 started on August 9 and from that 1^st round we can conclude that the new season will be enticing.  Paris Saint Germain is the stand out favourites to reclaim the title but they will have to fight off challenge from newly promoted AS Monaco who has acquired the services of Colombian sensation Radamel Falcao, French veteran Eric Abidal and Portuguese starlet Joao Moutinho amongst other.  Monaco will definitely be a force to reckon with in the French Ligue 1. PSG has made a huge step to fortify their squad by singing Edinson Cavani from Napoli this transfer was a questionable one. The area that PSG needs to improve most is their defence in last season’s campaign their defence line showed that there can definitely be room for improvement. One of the questions that the manager of PSG should have contemplated before signing Cavani was “Can Cavani and Ibrahimovic play together?” if we are to go to past one would notice that Zlatan normally play’s as the lone striker. It could be very difficult to pair the two forwards because they play similarly, so that Cavani deal was a gamble and I don’t think it will pay off. I am backing AS Monaco to cause an upset and steel the title from PSG.

AS Monaco is building a real champion contender team with experience players mixed with some young talents. They will only have the League to focus on and PSG will compete in the Champions League and the current French champions does not have a deep enough squad to rotate week in week out and that will play a huge role if they are to defend their title. They let go Diego Lugano who was a great defender and they have not gone out to replace him. This could be costly for the French Champions.

My Expectations

Falcao is a true talent so one could expect him to shine were ever he is playing. He has won the Europa League three times with two different clubs in different league so it is quite obvious that he is a talented player. I’m expecting Falcao to steel the goal scoring title from Ibrahimovic. Expect Marseille and Lyon to fight for third place and if Lyon loses their striker Gomis I’m not expecting much from them. Gomis has drawn the attention from Newcastle and rumour is that a deal is near. Everyone knows that Newcastle is trying to build a French Connection so it would not be a surprise if Gomis is to end up playing for the Magpies in the new season.

The 2013-2014 French season should be mouth-watering to the end. Expect lots of goals and flair as the league is growing in popularity each and every season.

My Predictions

At the end of the season the table will show

1^st AS Monaco

2^nd PSG

3^rd TBD.