By AVI CREDITOR
The John Terry foot-injury scare was all for nothing.
Tests revealed no serious damage in the Chelsea and English centerback's foot, and Terry has declared himself 100 percent fit for Saturday's FA Cup final against Portsmouth.
Terry collided with Daniel Sturridge in Wednesday's training session and feared the worst – having to miss the cup final and the World Cup. But after tests revealed no structural damage and just bruising, the former England captain returned to training on Thursday.
Terry and Chelsea will look to secure its second piece of silverware this season and its second consecutive FA Cup, while Portsmouth hopes to finish off its dream run in an otherwise dismal season in which the team went into administration and was relegated.
Here are a few more soccer stories from around the world:
MEXICAN CLUBS CANCEL ARIZONA FRIENDLY
Club America has pulled out of a slated July friendly with Pachuca citing Arizona's immigration law as its reason.
The match was supposed to be played at the University of Phoenix Stadium on July 7, but Club America has joined a long line of those opposed to the state's new immigration law that is among the most stringent in the country.
BERBATOV RETIRES FROM INTERNATIONAL PLAY
Manchester United striker Dimitar Berbatov has retired from international competition, leaving Bulgaria with a big hole to fill at the forward position.
Berbatov, just 29 years old, is Bulgaria's all-time leading scorer (48), but he was unable to guide the country to a World Cup berth. He cited being "exhausted" and also said that "there are many guys who can emerge from my shadow."
CARDIFF OUTLASTS LEICESTER IN PKS
Cardiff goalkeeper David Marshall saved two Leicester penalties after the two sides played to a 3-3 aggregate draw, leading his team one step closer to Premier League promotion.
Cardiff hasn't been in the top flight for 48 years, and it will need to get by Blackpool in the League Championship's final playoff round to do so. Cardiff finished the regular season in fourth place, six points clear of Blackpool.
Newcastle and West Brom have already been promoted.
PREMIER LEAGUE RUMOR MILL
- Tottenham and Liverpool are reportedly discussing a Roman Pavlyuchenko-for-Yossi Benayoun swap.
- French defender William Gallas' days at Arsenal appear to be over.
- Didier Drogba would gladly welcome Fernando Torres to Chelsea.
- Chelsea's Portuguese internationals Ricardo Carvalho and Deco are for sale.
- Cesc Fabregas would like to figure out what his club future holds before the start of the World Cup.
- Roy Hodgson commits his future to Fulham.
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What do you make of Terry's non-injury news? Do you support Club America's decision? Surprised that Berbatov would retire from Bulgaria? Which team would you like to see secure promotion? What do you think about all the Premier League rumblings?
Share your thoughts below.
By the way California, those of us who run our states in a responsible manner don’t want you running to the Government for a bail-out once you’ve run your state into the ground.
Enjoy watching a soccer game in the dark.
You’re totally spot on with Mexico’s hypocrisy, Dave. I’m sure AZ will deal just fine.
Rory, you sir are annoying as hell with ur dam posts….i’m on here to read about soccer man, not your views on politics
So, you suggest that ANYONE who tries to evade minor crimes and violations must provide papers, or as in point 3 anyone who is in contact with police must provide papers or be hauled to Sheriff Joe’s tent. Can you specify when a person in AZ might NOT be required to show papers, and face arrest upon failure to do so?
Remember, Rory, you earlier wanted to rely on “trained professional police who will have to make the judgement if someone needs to produce proof that they are not breaking the law (by being here illegally”
How, specifically again, are they to ‘make the judgement’ and when would they judge not to ask for my papers?
Pachuca and America are only punishing their own fans. The only peeople who would care enough to buy tickets to that game are mexicans in Phoenix. The rest of the population won’t know or care about the game anyway. Dumb way to make a stand.
It’s simple economics: you don’t like Arizona, you don’t buy in Arizona. What’s more American than that?
Freedom of choice. Remember that?
BTW, America vs. Pachuca, call us.
What is the discrimination in asking someone you’ve arrested or someone who is applying for gov’t help or a job to show that they are legal? Young people have to prove they are of a certain age to work. I have to give my social security number to about everything I do. Criminals have to prove they are who they say they are when they are arrested.
What is the difference?
“If anyone should be ashamed of the way they treat illegal immigrants, it should be Mexico.”
This seems to me like a Mexican team using anti-American sentiment as a business decision. Your point is a nice view into the hypocrisy of it all.
Thank you, dave
Nope, you said they pulled it because of the “negative impression Arizona’s new laws would give to potential voters” whereas I said they didn’t want viewers to see the counter-protests in the streets by lots of hispanics. The law itself is not what is keeping Republicans out of Phoenix. It is the photo-op that could made by the other party and how that could be used for decades against Republicans.
To be fair, even months ago the Republicans were saying Phoenix was a long shot as the Houstan 88 convention was a sweaty mess that didn’t send the right message as every Republican on camera was sweaty and dissheveled.
No where in the law does it say police will stop anyone for any reason to do with immigration. However, if they stop you for another crime or if you apply for government help or even a job and you can’t prove you’re legal, then you can be in trouble for this crime as well as any other you have committed.
And Spain took the land from the Natives before that. And those Natives fought other natives for the land before that.
What was your point?
Have none of you read the law? It doesn’t say cops can pull over/stop people for looking like an illegal. It clearly states that gov’t officials must check status
“during any legitimate contact made by an official or agency of the state or a county”
So all this talk of racial profiling is a smokescreen put up by those that either want to insure more illegal immigrants come in or those who have decided to put emotions up front instead of reading the law!
http://www.azleg.gov/legtext/49leg/2r/summary/s.1070pshs.doc.htm
If I am not mistaken the law does not go into effect until July 23rd. With the game being played on July 7th I don’t think it would have made a difference.
assists should count to right? also you have to consider that those are 30 appearences and not 30 whole games.
Easy.
Running from the cops when they try to bust you for a minor crime or violation that normally wouldn’t result in someone running.
Trying to apply for a job without giving any social security number or visa number would be pretty obvious.
And most importantly, when busting someone for another crime they won’t just turn a blind eye to their legal status as is common in California.
The price is more appropriately being put on the cost of discriminating against a certain type of ‘your own citizens’
Rory. Yes protect. We already educate their children and give government handouts to illegal immigrants. I do not have a problem with immigrants, but with the process(some illegally) that come across the borders. When traveling in Europe it isnt uncommon for you to be asked for your papers. I was woken up on a train in the middle of the night in Italy and had my stuff searched because i was American. I do not hold a grudge. THis is what they had to do since Americans were smuggling drugs into their country.
um, yeah. That’s what I said. The Republicans pulled their convention from AZ due to it’s recent legislation.
Wouldn’t call 30 games and only 2 goals a success…
Or protecting them.
It’s funny nobody is complaining about next January’s NCAA Football championship being there.
But you could figure out a price if you could determine how much more the government spends on law enforcement, public services including educating the children of illegals, and any gov’t handouts including foodstamps and such.
Let’s stop wasting our time and money. Let’s get the taxes to construct a Great Wall of America across the border. Crocodiles in the gulf and problem solved.
Yes my grandmother is Mexican and no I have not read the official document to scan for racism so like 99% of people in this forum, I can’t properly comment without quoting tabloid media and personal opinion masked in fake facts and distortions.
How many of the 80k do you thing would be behaving in a suspicious manner? Would all 80k be running from routine stops? Would all 80k be applying for work without a social security number or proper immigrant labor papers?
It’s not like they’re going through the seats demanding papers because they’re cheering on a Mexican team. If that was the case we could do the same to the Eurosnobs that show up wearing an England jersey to an MLS game. On second though… I’m all for that.
Please specify: what exactly is it that the ‘trained professional’ will observe to determine that one person needs to be asked for papers while another person does not? Again, please be specific.
Anyone thinking this could be good for Eddie JOhnson if Cardiff come up to the Premier League? After he returns to Fulham off loan and if they want to loan him out again what place better than Cardiff where he had a successful loan last year? Glad as a CHelsea fan that Terry is fit for Saturday!!!
The irony of the foreign entitites remark is, of course, the state in question was once part of Mexico and was stolen as part of “one of the most unjust [wars]ever waged on a weaker country by a stronger.”
What commie pinko unpatriotic bastard said that? FOrmer President U S Grant.
You cannot put a price on protacting your own citizens.
Nope. The Republicans didn’t want to create a potential firestorm ala the Chicago ’68 convention the Dems held.
Also, Florida is very much in play while Arizona is pretty much a Republican lock.
Never ever cite opinion polls, depending on the wording you could get a group of people to support anything. My grandparents on my mothers side were both born in Mexico, both came legally (marriage, and to supply labor during WW2),and i understand the need for immigration reform. BUT, this law is insane, I, an American citizen, could be asked for my papers due to the color of my skin (dark)!!!, (yes i understand that now it would have to be suspected of committing a crime)…and you better believe my “lucky” sister who’s skin is lighter then Glen Becks (funny how things work out) would never be asked for them. If you don’t see whats wrong with that then …well there is no hope for us. i applaud Pachuca and Club America.
If anyone should be ashamed of the way they treat illegal immigrants, it should be Mexico. 2 years in prison for the first offense and up to 10 years in prison for the second offense. These Mexican teams and companies and politicians should spend less time being mad at Arizona for wanting protect its borders and work on improving their economy so people won’t feel the need to cross the border.
There is nothing Unconstitutional about this law, nor the federal law that it copies. The law clearly states there must be reasonable suspicion. Just like the constitution uses the very similar term “unreasonable search and seizure.”
We have trained professional police who will have to make the judgement if someone needs to produce proof that they are not breaking the law (by being here illegally) just as they do with virtually every other law. Will some cops make a bad call and bother a legal citizen? Yeah, but then again I’ve been stopped at a roadblock every New Years Eve since 1999.
If you want to boycott Arizona, go ahead. I completely understand Mexican teams not wanting to play in a state that could possibly deport a huge amount of their fans that have arrived hear illegally. But Major League Baseball had better watch out if they boycott Arizona because the 70% of Americans that support the law just might turn the boycott tables on them.
The 2011 MLB All-Star game may also move out of Arizona. The money lost by that state just keeps adding up, I hope they’re happy in the state legislature.
Fabregas is leaving. All this back and forth is posturing. If he does leave, I don’t think Arteta is an upgrade. Let’s hope Wenger honors his word (or idea) that this will be a summer of spending.
Teams are going to love visiting Blackpool…
Well, I’d bet that someone could come up with a survey question cleverly worded in a certain way that the results could be then interpreted to say that ‘the majority of Americans are against MLK day’. I’m almost surprised that never happened.
Kinda like when a survey asks ‘do you like how the health care bill has been “handled”?’, pundits talk about the results of it as if the question was ‘do you like the health care bill?’. Those are 2 completely different questions, but who cares about accuracy when you’ve got an agenda to put forward? It’s obvious to anyone who saw that while the majority of the responses to the “handled” question were negative, the majority of the responses to questions regarding what was actually in the bill were positive, that people aren’t against the bill itself, they’re against the dumb way it was brought through the legislature. For some reason you heard less talk about the fact that surveys said people like what was in the bill. Must be that liberal media bias we always hear about.
I wish they would have played the game and staged a bunch of interruptions where the police demand to see the players’ papers…
This isn’t sports and politics mixing, its business and politics mixing. A business decided not to do business because of a local policy. Pachuca could argue that by tacitly condoning the Arizona immigration law, it could lose supporters and thus money. It’s the same as choosing to play elsewhere because of a better tax rate.
Business and politics mix all the time.
The republican party chose Tampa Fl over Phoenix AZ for it’s 2012 presidential convention due to the negative impression Arizona’s new laws would give to potential voters. People who are really punished by this? republican fans.
How anyone can support that discrimination law is beyond me.
I applaud Club America for it’s decision.
Yes, sport and politics shouldn’t mix, but sometimes you have to make a stand. This law is unconstitutional and a very slippery slope to infringing on our civil rights. First it’s us darker skinned folk, then people who don’t look “American”, then it’s anyone who doesn’t agree with a particular viewpoint, then…
Anyhow, Deco is on sale? I wonder is RBNY seeing if there’s a potential deal there.
Berba joins his flopmate Zlatan as another overpriced early int’l retiree.
Brilliant. =)
And I’m sure there is a Terry Stop joke to be made in this post, but it escapes me.
The real winners? The PHX cops who don’t have to ask 80k people to pull their papers.
Your papers, please. Maybe you should get off the fence, read the law, and figure out how it could possibly be applied without being embarrassingly discriminatory against non-white people generally, and people of latin descent specifically. These two ‘foreign entities’ are not telling ‘our country’ how to act, they are telling AZ directly that it is legislating bigotry.
I love this, “state’s new immigration law that is among the most stringent in the country.”
Too bad its actually one of the LEAST stringent in the world.
Really dumb deal, IMHO, because who are the people that are really punished by this? The Mexican fans.
Cardiff has never been in the Premier League. The old first division, yes, but never the Premier League.
Good for America & Pachuca! This is the same state that refused to acknowledge MLK’s b-day as a national holiday, until money talked & the Super Bowl was taken away from them. How’s that for sports & politics mixing?
Yeah, because if those guys don’t feel welcome there, they shouldn’t be allowed to express that? Maybe those guys think that if they’re going to be playing somewhere, they’d like to be able to walk down the street without cops looking at them.
As an Arsenal supporter, good riddance to Gallas. Not only is he a very average center back, he’s a cancer. I can’t believe he’s lasted this long as a Gunner given his level of play. He might just be one of the worst set piece defenders that I’ve seen suit up for Arsenal. What’s scary is that Verm and Sol were the best tandem that Arsenal produced this year. Silvestre…yikes. Berlhalter might have more pace. The Gunners have more than enough cash to purchase a decent CD.
Sports and politics should not mix. While I personally am on the fence on the Arizona law, I respect the fact that a majority of Americans support it as written. If people here want to protest and change the law, I support their right to do so. However, it’s not up to foreign entities to tell our country how to act. I hope Arizona slaps a 30 year ban on those clubs participating in sports there.
Roy Hodgson is great for Fulham. I really like this guy. He is a traveled manager and has done well at his previous clubs, but what he has done with Fulham is magical.