Rome Champions League Final - next Wednesday

Champions League final better than a World Cup final?

Only one week we still have to wait before watching the massive Champions League Final from the Eternal City of Rome. The old and same time the new England champion Manchester United will face FC Barcelona, another continent's domestic league winner on Stadio Olimpico, next Wednesday, 27 of May from 19:45 GMT in what experts anticipate it would be one of the greatest finals of all time. The great clash will be live in Britain on Sky Sports 1.
At the end of the game we will see whether Manchester United will become the first team to defend its cup won a year ago or would be a fantastic season for Barcelona by achieving its third Champions League trophy alongside with the Spanish League and Copa del Rey (Spanish Cup).

Most of football fans believe that this is the right final due to the excellent shape of both teams in 2008-2009 season. The final stage is the best way we can argue which team is the best. It is also the world's best players duel: the present Ballon d'Or winner Cristiano Ronaldo or a possible future one, the little Argentine Leo Messi.

Both squads have won the leagues in their countries. Manchester United have won it mathematically last Saturday on Old Traford against the rivals from Arsenal after a 0-0 game. Barcelona have assured their Liga after humiliating on Bernabeu the all time rivals Real Madrid with an incredible 6-2.

Let's rememorate how the next week's finalists got through the rounds in their way to Rome.

Manchester United

At the biginning of winter the Red Devils got the first place of Group E with only one point more than Villareal, a team which caused to them problems, holding up the CL winners in two consecutive draws. In the next stage, a 0-0 on San Siro and a secure 2-0 win back at Old Traford against Italian champions Internationale got them to the quarter finals. Surpringly, FC Porto was tougher to knock out than Inter. Man UTD drew 2-2 at Old Traford and weren't so sure that will get to semis. But a superb 35 meters shot from Ronaldo's right foot saved the Red Devils and it assured a spot in the semi-final against Arsenal. The two leg semi-final with the Londoneer side was apparently a much easier task for Manchester UTD than it was in the previous stage. They won 1-0 at Old Traford by John O'Shea's header and 3-1 at Emirates, with Ji-Sung Park, and Cristiano Ronaldo two times scoring. Robert Van Pesie scored the only goal of Arsenal in both games.

Barcelona

The 'blau-grana' side won easily their Group C, scoring 18 goals against teams like Sporting Lisbon, FC Basel or the fresh Uefa Cup winners Shakthar Donetsk. In the first knockout stage they eliminated the champions of France Lyon. With a draw in the first leg and a comfortable 5-2 win at New Camp, Barcelona progressed to the quarters. Another easy pass and again against some other champions, Bayern Munich. Barcelona scored four goals in the first game in Catalunia conceiding none and drew at the Munich stadium, in the second leg. But way harder it was when the catalan squad faced Chelsea in semis. Despite attacking Petr Czech's goal almost all the time, Barcelona did not succeed to score in the first leg. The game from Stamford Bridge was simply thrilling, a drama which it was won in the last minute by Barcelona. Essien opened the score for Chelsea in the ninth minute with one of the best Champions League goals ever. Chelsea made a good defensive game in both halfs, but luckly for Barcelona, Andres Iniesta scored in stoppage time and put Barça into the final.

Canterbury plays for Britain

Having one of the most numerous young populations in the UK, with over 30,000 students, Canterbury could be the place that will produce some stars for the London Olympics 2012, especially for the tennis tournament.

Since Britain’s new tennis talent Andy Murray came to the scene, the “white sport” in this country entered in a new era. Maybe sooner than everybody thinks we will see the first British winner at Wimbledon in the last seventy years. Now youngsters from all over the country want to be like Andy Murray, the kid who has learned tennis in the highlands of Scotland.

Taking part in this “tennis revolution”, Canterbury has one of the best tennis clubs in the South East, where many kids are learning the secrets of this sport, hoping that one day they will reach the top of the ATP rankings. John Gotke is the coach of Canterbury Lawn Tennis and his main job is to discover and prepare young tennis players in all over Kent to win Grand Slam events and-why not: the Davis Cup. He said:

“I am here to teach tennis for everyone who wants to, but my main job is to find young talents who could represent the next generation of this sport”.

Canterbury Lawn Tennis has a modern infrastructure with six floot-lit astro courts, two grass courts and a brand new indoor centre. In July 2006 the three-court indoor centre was officially opened.

The tennis centre is a part of Polo Farm Sports Club. Besides tennis teams, there are hockey clubs (men, women and junior), football, lacrosse, cricket and croquet. Polofarm is also the venue of several sports teams of Christ Church University: hockey, lacrosse and tennis. In order to sustain the youngsters who play tennis, Canterbury Tennis Club is the home of a junior open tournament that takes place every year, at the beginning of August. This year’s open has taken place between 4-8 Augusts. This is a LTA Grade 4 tournament and it is an event of East Kent Tour 2008.

The club has its origins back in 1948, when a bunch of people created a place where they could spend their spare time doing what they like, to play tennis. Now there are more then 20 teams: men’s, women’s, mixed, vets, juniors. These teams that have about 200 senior and 80 junior members are competing in the Kent, East Kent and Dover leagues.

This is a club like many others in the UK that one day perhaps will put forward some great names for the British tennis, possibly even greater than our day’s champions Tim Henman and Andy Murray.

The Romania’s Davis Cup captain Andrei Pavel: “Now we have only regrets”

Tennis – Davis Cup First Round Romania 1-3 Russia

Romania crashed out of the Davis Cup in the first round at weekend

We have spoken to Andrei Pavel, the non-playing captain of the Romanian Davis Cup team, 48 hours after losing the first round fixture against Russia. Pavel, 35 years old, officially retired in January at the Australian Open to take in charge the captaincy of the Romanian Davis Cup team, told us about the reasons which led to this defeat.

Bogdan Briceag:
How do you feel now, after this defeat, knowing that your team was so close to knock out Russia?

Andrei Pavel:
Of course I’m feeling bad. If Victor [Victor Hanescu, the team’s top ATP player] had won his match against Tursunov, we could be playing the last game having the chance to go through the next round. But this hasn’t happened and now we have only regrets.

B B:
What were you saying to Victor in the first two sets, when he won easily and how did you encourage him from the moment he started to lose point after point, until the time he eventually lost the match?

A P:
In the first two sets Victor had so much confidence and he played such a good tennis. I simply gave him the usual advice that a Davis Cup captain gives to his player: stay focused; keep doing the good job, nothing too technical. Victor doesn’t need that, because he is a top ATP player. Victor still has some physical problems, caused by some old injuries which makes it difficult for him to play a 5-set-match as he faced on Sunday. The sad thing is that he was so close of beating Tursunov in three sets but he did not succeed. Those break points that Victor had in the third game of the third set could be considered the match’s psychological moment. He didn’t win any of them and he lost his confidence and the fatigue started to build step by step.

B B:
You are right. The boys were very close to taking Russia out of the tournament. But as so often before, in all spectrums, the bad luck and other “factors” leave us only the bitter taste of excuses like: “if we had...” or “we should win but...”. But leave this behind now. Please tell us what are your future plans?


A P:
As you know I am starting to build my tennis academy which should be complete in about two years time. For this purpose I will travel all the country to as many tennis clubs as possible to see talented young tennis players. As soon as the weather gets fine, I intend to resume the “Play a game with Andrei Pavel” campaign to encourage youngster to come to play tennis. I want to show my appreciation to our sponsors for their help that they give us. Regarding the Davis Cup team, I will follow every potential tennis player who could join it for the next meeting in September 2009 when the world group playoffs are scheduled.