Jim White

Carling Cup now playground of rich

Wed Oct 28 12:48PM

Assuming that the game does not succumb to the sort of contagion of hacking and spitting not seen outside the movie 28 Days Later, Chelsea will take on Bolton Wanderers in the Carling Cup tonight.

The home side will be fortified against the arrival of the swine flu in the Bolton baggage by Carlo Ancelotti's patented remedy: warm milk and red wine. But such is the prevalence of the virus among Bolton's players, in the event of a draw at the end of extra time maybe the referee could decide things by a snot-off. Instead of penalties, the first side to fill an entire box of tissues with mucus would be the winner.

Flu concerns aside, the Carling Cup seems in oddly bouncing health this year. Maybe the sponsors have bunged a case or two of their product to the relevant managers in order to help concentrate their minds, but having once been viewed as a distraction from the real aims of the season, an irritating diversion from the accumulation of league points or advancement in Europe, now the Premier League bosses are taking it seriously.

Unless Scunthorpe manage to overturn £150m of Manchester City's competitive advantage tonight, all eight quarter-finalists in the competition will hail from the top division. This is a challenge they are all beginning to relish.

That said, each team has a different priority. Manchester United's Alex Ferguson once provoked questions in the House of Commons following his decision to play his youth team in a League Cup game at Port Vale. But now, for United, Arsenal and Liverpool this has become standard practice.

Interestingly, the growing gap in quality between Premier League and the rest is allowing the managers to enjoy longer runs in the competition for their experimentation. When Ferguson first did it in the early nineties, his youthful selections lost to the likes of York City. And that was with a side including Paul Scholes, Nicky Butt, David Beckham and Gary Neville. Yesterday, Barnsley - a team two divisions above where York were then placed - were comfortably brushed aside by the youthful presence of the Da Silva twins, Danny Welbeck and, er, Michael Owen.

For clubs like Spurs and Villa, it is a chance for the manager to give disgruntled fringe players a run-out and challenge them to press for a regular start. Martin O'Neill even played Emile Heskey last night. Though quite what that says about England coach Fabio Capello's affection for the player it is probably best not to pursue. Here was the man he has earmarked to lead his attack in the World Cup reckoned strong enough by his club manager only to start in the second string competition when the result doesn't really matter. And even then not managing to find the target.

Meanwhile, Harry Redknapp was demonstrating to the Spurs fans precisely why he favours Robbie Keane, Peter Crouch, Jermain Defoe and practically everyone else over Roman Pavlyuchenko. No wonder the Spurs manager likes the competition: it gives him the ideal opportunity to prove that he is right without any real consequence.

And so the Carling Cup progresses towards its denouement, a strange hybrid of reserve competition and youth cup, with the teams outside the Premier League providing little more than a bit of grist in the development of the big boys' squads.

Things will change as it gets closer to Wembley and managers begin to sniff of silverware, but for now it gives the fans of the top teams a cheery chance to analyse the depth of their squad, to encounter future heroes and best of all to play shirt number bingo: if the sum of your team's numbers adds up to more than 150, you know you are in for an interesting night.

For everyone else, it is yet further proof that in football the rich are getting richer and the poor are left without even the scraps to fight over.

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Shame he got the team wrong! Chelsea play BOLTON tonight
From dave.seviour on Wed Oct 28 01:02PM
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1st
From garypatrickson on Wed Oct 28 01:08PM
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I thought that Welbeck was 'advised' by SAF against arrogant goal celebrations... Judging by the poncey pose in the photograph the kid either doesn't listen or has a short memory.
From lawrence43 on Wed Oct 28 01:15PM
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OMG couldn't be anymore wrong. Blackburn played Peterborough last night and won 5-2. Chelsea host Bolton, I've actually lost all respect now for this dude.
From sammydaddo on Wed Oct 28 01:16PM
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BTW, anyone reading this article, how wrong it may be, take a close look at the accompanying image. See that player behind Welbeck on the right. He's a freak of nature and will be one of the best players in the world. Imagine Henry with more pace and then you have.......GABRIEL OBERTAN!!!
From sammydaddo on Wed Oct 28 01:21PM
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No mention of Sunday's game then Jim? no? okay we'll let it go then.
From fneedle on Wed Oct 28 01:23PM
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Hey 2,7 & 8 can't you read properly ? He says Chelsea are playing Bolton ! Read the article again slowly,maybe taking down notes has you go and you will see at no time does he get Chelseas opponents tonight wrong.
From porloc on Wed Oct 28 01:39PM
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From davidzhan22 on Wed Oct 28 01:39PM
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Blolton? Sounds like Blackburn and Bolton have merged.
From davidkelly_ireland on Wed Oct 28 01:56PM
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The real question is, why have a League Cup at all? We already have the FA Cup, so there is no need to have a cheap, cynically created, commercial copy of the real thing. Dump it, or at least don't complain if the League Cup is used as an experimental ground for young (or neglected) players. It simply doesn't rate.
That's why I don't have much angst for my beloved Reds and will not be gutted if they lose tonight at the Emirates - and will not feel anything like the high I got Sunday when we beat the Mancs, if we should beat Arsenal tonight.
It just doesn't matter very much. It's like owning a cheap $20 HK "Rolex" compared to having the real thing.
From monson.theknole on Wed Oct 28 01:57PM
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2, 7 and 8 you are the illiterate!!!!! must be United supporters?????
The article says in the first paragraph that Celsea play Bolton
Get yourselves back to school ya numpties
From cgrundy61 on Wed Oct 28 01:58PM
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sammydaddo etc are you blind,he says chelsea take on bolton you bunch of plums crikey read it before you slate it.please.
From tommy_cockles2 on Wed Oct 28 02:03PM
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well I guess he has fixed the article but the title is still wrong
From jd.simbine on Wed Oct 28 02:44PM
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What a boring article. How do these guys stay in there job? Absolutely no point or argument raised in this drivel. This entire website is riddled with shocking, mediocre, rubbish, lazy journalism.
From davidsmart14 on Wed Oct 28 02:50PM
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I suspect the error was corrected after the first comments. Sneaky. But what a load of rubbish as usual. And disgusting.
From michelangeloindeed on Wed Oct 28 02:53PM
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All you tools insulting others saying they can't read, hasn't it occurred to you the article was corrected subsequently??
Idiots.
From wa.irvine on Wed Oct 28 02:59PM
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Jim, being a RED (of Liverpool that is) I somehow manged to have a lot of respect to you and your writing, but to avoid writing on Sunday's game is a bit of a blow... disappointing.
From kbadr116 on Wed Oct 28 02:59PM
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From appleloving35 on Wed Oct 28 03:22PM
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stupid article again. just another thinly veiled excuse to talk about man utd...........
From willjh_2003 on Wed Oct 28 04:05PM
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Feel free to view hot babes a t A froMingle / C o M --- for fun and more ........
From nancyskymoore on Wed Oct 28 04:19PM
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I quote cgrundy61:
2, 7 and 8 you are the illiterate!!!!! must be United supporters?????
The article says in the first paragraph that Celsea play Bolton
Get yourselves back to school ya numpties
Oh the irony!
From kpughmu on Wed Oct 28 04:46PM
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go on scunthorpe!
I hate you, but not as much as man city!
Lets make this competition interesting!!
From oliverbaily on Wed Oct 28 04:55PM
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this is such a @#$% article
From levz86 on Wed Oct 28 05:12PM
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Feel free to view hot babes a t A froMingle / C o M --- for fun and more ........
ff
From nancyskymoore on Wed Oct 28 05:38PM
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If Alcorcon can beat Real Comedy Madrid 4:0 there is no reason why S* c*u*n*Thorpe United should not beat Manchesar City, besides SU have got much better players
From arttidesco on Wed Oct 28 06:05PM
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The shirt numbers on the Man City Squad will probably add up to more than a 1000 LMAO
From arttidesco on Wed Oct 28 06:10PM
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Why not make this a Championship and League trophy, so that the lower teams can win some glory and experience winning a cup. The FA Cup gives everyone a chance of glory against the prem teams. This cup is just a side line for experimenting and giving youth squads experience for the top clubs untl the semis and final, they say its greatr if they win it and not important if they don't. In reality to the Top prem teams it isn't, Its behind Prem., Champions League, Uefa(Europa) Cup, FA Cup and a Cup of Tea!!!!!
From djh184 on Wed Oct 28 07:15PM
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Comment 33, Its easy to pick fault with Man. City as they now have big money but look how good it has made Chelsea in less than a decade. Man. City fans have endured years of hardship from the bottom of the old 2nd division to the top of the prem. and always in the shadow of thier local Utd rivals!! So give them a break and I think with, Spurs, Villa, Everton, Fulham and maybe even Sunderland the 3rd and 4th spots may be more interestingly contected in the forthcoming seasons, other clubs also may join the battle with rumours of more big money buy outs looming on the horizon.
From djh184 on Wed Oct 28 07:43PM
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kbadr116, he's not a Red. He's a lifelong Man United fan.
From victor_kruchinkin on Wed Oct 28 07:58PM
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Recently, I found an age-gap club called-- Agegapmingle--C O M --It's a nice and free place for Younger Women and Older Men, or Older Women and Younger Men, to interact with each other. Age gap is not problem there. You may check out or tell your friends.
From summerlovingcome on Wed Oct 28 08:34PM
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