While there were many highs throughout the years, with Chelsea winning their first double in the club's history by playing exquisite attacking football, which culminated with the 8-0 thrashing of Wigan on the final day of the season to clinch the title by 1 point from Manchester United. They followed that up with a victory over Portsmouth in the FA Cup final to complete the double. The 10/11 season started off as the 09/10 finished for Chelsea, with 8 wins in their first 10 games scoring nearly 30 goals in the process. But a slump towards the end of the year has led to the most open title race in years, with as many as 5 teams with a decent chance to win the league.
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| Chelsea: 2009/2010 Barclays Premier League Champions |
The first World Cup in Africa was not the most enjoyable with dividing opinions on the vuvuzelas as well as the quality of football on show, the eventual winners, Spain, was the one bright spark, providing viewers with a brand of football which many teams aspire and dream to be able to achieve. With small clever players like Xavi and Iniesta, they were able to pass their way to success and showed that positive attacking football would provide sucess.
Whilst Spain were deserving winners, England once again failed to shine on the big stage. A howler from Robert Green and a drab draw with Algeria did not provide much entertainment for the English viewing public while the sole victory against Slovakia was hardly inspiring. The debate over Lampard's "goal" will ensure many hours of heated discussions, but the simple fact that Germany outplayed England showed that giving young players the chance to shine could pay off and it was time to follow the German model.
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| The "goal" that never was |
An octopus also hit the headlines in the World Cup. Paul the Octopus correctly predicted the winner of Germany's seven World Cup matches as well as the outcome of the final. Paul the Octopus was presented with two boxes with food inside, each box was marked with the flags of both teams and whichever he climbed into first would be the supposed prediction for the winner of that certain match. He was made a celebrity over night and was one of the highlights of the World Cup.
FIFA's decision to award Russia and Qatar the 2018 and 2022 World Cups were controversial decisions, with many believing that the best bids ultimately did not win. FIFA's reason for choosing the two countries was that they wanted to "go to new lands" and a desire to "develop football" by bringing it to different countries. The bidding process was also clouded with allegations over corruption by the FIFA Executive Committee members with the Sunday Times and BBC Paronama which alleged that they were taking bribes for votes on World Cup bids. This has led to much criticism over how the decision process is made and that such an important decision should not be left to a committee of people.
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| Sepp Blatter announcing that Qatar has been picked to host the 2022 World Cup |
In the Champions League, the final was contested between Inter Milan and Bayern Munich with Inter winning courtesy of a brace from Diego Milito. The win rounded off an excellent season for the Nerazzurri by becoming the first Italian club to win the treble of the League, Italian Cup and the Champions League. This also added another feather to the ever increasing number of feathers on the cap of the "Special One" Jose Mourinho. The win virtually guaranteed the job at arguably the biggest club in the world; Real Madrid, for Mourinho.
The 2010/11 season of the Champions League saw the emergence of Gareth Bale onto the world scene, with some excellent performances against the current holders Inter, making Maicon look like a sunday leagye player at best. His excellence performance for Tottenham in the Champions League has caught the attention of many big clubs like Barcelona and Real Madrid, who are all apparently fighting for his signature. The Champions League also saw the first Danish club to qualify for the knockout stages for the first time with Copenhagen finishing 2nd behind Barcelona. It shapes up to be an excellent tournament going into 2011, where we will see some great matches, with Arsenal v Barcelona the pick of the bunch.
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| Bale running at the Inter defence once again |
A final mention to the amazing game between Barcelona and Real Madrid at the Camp Nou on 29th November 2010, where it was a joy to watch Barcelona and their masterclass in attacking football with an excellent 5-0 mauling of Los Blancos.
The past year has been a great year for football and 2011 looks like it might exceed the great heights which were set in 2010.
