

Offside Rewind: Let’s Be Friends
By: Daryl |Seven stories from The Offside and World Cup Blog this week:
Nominate your player/manager football ubermen
Gigi’s Buffon’s incredible Champions League save
Ballon d’Or or FIFA World Player of the Year: Which is shinier?
Norwegian homage to Brazilian airport ad
The return of Johan Cruyff. To Catalonia.
Stephen Appiah: No longer just an international footballer
Hatem Ben Arfa is an [...]
Better Flying Kick: Cruijff or Cantona?
By: chris |We thank The Guardian, who thank Zlatan Ibrahimovic for reminding them, for reminding us of this goal, scored by one Hendrik Johannes Cruijff. A guy who once did some things way back when. Certainly one of the greatest goals ever, but is it the greatest flying kick football has ever seen? Many will say yes, [...]
Weekend Quiz Answers: Who Were Those Legends?
By: Laurie |First, if you haven’t yet done our Weekend Quiz, stop by this post to see if you can identify our players.
So who were the international legends in my quiz? Every one of them was guessed by someone among our readership, but all of them were not guessed by any one person. [...]
Great Example of That Trick Penalty Thingy With No Name
By: Daryl |http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5bVaTuxN-g
This is a nice little penalty manoeuvre from Brazil, scored by two América players against Ideal.
From the spot, Euller flicks the ball forward to Douglas, who appears from off camera to roll the ball home.
Nicely done. It’s certainly better than the Robert Pires/Thierry Henry disaster in 2005. More successful attempts from Rik Coppens and later [...]
Dutch Police Clog up the Eredivise Title Race (sorry)
By: Daryl |Not a great week for Ajax fans. First the return of the hallowed Johan Cruyff (who’s like the Kevin Keegan of Ajax, except he knows about football) ended in shambles. Cruyff had been brought in to revamp the Ajax set up, but when he tried to do exactly that with an overhaul of the youth [...]
Ajax Get the Marco Van Basten-Johan Cruyff Dream Team
By: Daryl |Looks like Ajax are getting it together. After bringing in the legend that is Johan Cruyff in a sort of grand overseeer role, the Eredivisie club have now found themselves a proper manager to replace current caretaker Adrie Koster. And his name is Marco van Basten. We already knew MvB was stepping down from the [...]
Johan Cruyff Brought in to Turn Ajax Around
By: Daryl |It wasn’t so long ago that Ajax were one of the powers in European football, with a youth system everyone wanted to copy. But it’s all gone a bit wrong recently. The once dominant Dutch club hasn’t won the Eredivisie since 2004, and only three times in the last ten years. And if the 1995 [...]
Origins of the Infamous 1982 Cruyff Penalty
By: Daryl |Remember this famous Johan Cruyff penalty for Ajax in 1982? Instead of shooting at goal like mere mortals, Cruyff passed the ball to teammate Jesper Olsen, who then drew the keeper before returning the ball to Cruyff, who passed the ball into an empty net. Brilliant stuff, which Robert Pires failed to emulate in 2005.
I’d [...]
All the kids will be trying “the Inzaghi” now
By: Daryl |Have a good look at Pippo Inzaghi’s first goal for Milan in the Champions League final, then compare these two quotes:
“It was luck, but that is football” – Liverpool boss Rafa Benitez
“It was something that we rehearsed in training” – the man himself, Pippo Inzaghi.




