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Kenny Dalglish, one of the greatest players to have pulled on the Number 7 shirt at Liverpool, has done a fantastic job in turning the club’s fortunes around as the Merseyside club look challenge for fifth place in this year’s Premier League. His job has been made easier by the willingness of the club’s new owners to reinvest the money earned from the sale of Fernando Torres in Andy Carroll and, more importantly Luis Suarez.

Handed the Number 7 shirt by Dalglish, the Uruguayan has had a phenomenal opening eleven games to his Liverpool career. His return of four goals doesn’t do justice to the phenomenal work rate and superb vision that has helped create numerous goals for his teammates.

Following the loss of their leading marksman, fans initially looked towards Andy Carroll as the man to lead the line in his absence. But, due to an injury picked up at Newcastle, the England striker did not make his debut until the victory over Manchester United in March. But it has instead been the cheaper acquisition, albeit still at a cost of £23 million, who has stolen the plaudits.

Some felt Suarez might suffer a similar problem to Mateja Kezman at Chelsea. Whilst prolific in Holland, Kezman struggled to make the step up to the Premier League and was shipped out of Chelsea after a single season with only four goals to his name. But, in already passing Kezman’s tally of goals, Suarez has proved himself far better at adapting to the English game.

Comparing Suarez to the likes of Kezman or Torres is a harsh comparisons, however, as he is a completely different type of player. With his pace, creativity, energy and goalscoring ablity he is far more similar to previous wearers of the 7 shirt such as Dalglish and, before him, Kevin Keegan.

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A player capable of lifting both fans and teammates alike, Liverpool have mustered 27 goals in the 11 games Suarez has played. Compare this to the 11 games before his arrival, where Liverpool only scored 14 times, and his influence is obvious.

But it is still very early days in his Liverpool career and fans must be careful not to pile on too much pressure before next season. Suarez has joined a transformed Liverpool team with momentum on their side where even the likes of Maxi Rodriguez and Dirk Kuyt have found goals plentiful. Only continued performances next season as Liverpool look to push for the return of Champions League football will confirm whether Suarez will continue to be a class performer for Liverpool for years to come.

In the short term, however, he has proved a great bit of business. Fans have warmed to the ex-Ajax man and, in cashing in on an inconsistent and unhappy striker in Fernando Torres and replacing him with two potential young stars, Suarez and Carroll look like representing great value for money and a bright future at Anfield.

FootballFanCast.com WORLD Exclusive, Robbie Savage’s Face in a Baby Scan

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David Moyes has promised a more hard-line approach as he looks to kick-start Everton's disappointing season into life.

Moyes was furious with his players after Saturday's 1-0 defeat at home to Newcastle United left the Toffees without a win from their first five games of the new Premier League season.

The Goodison Park outfit have picked up just two points from the first 15 on offer and Moyes has vowed to turn up the heat on his squad in a bid to improve results.

He said:"Maybe I need to get tougher with them. Maybe I need to go back to some of the old ways. We'll soon see what they're like then.

"I've been telling them for a long time that they are good players and a good team. Maybe I need to change what I am telling them.

"They have to earn the right to play for this team. Newcastle went about their job in a way we didn't.

"This was certainly our poorest performance since last year and that has been the biggest shock for me. So now is the time when I have to do something about it.

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"We're capable of so much more and it's in times like this that the lead comes from the manager.

"So I have to be the one who has to change my outlook in what I expect from them from now on."Subscribe to Football FanCast News Headlines by Email

Tottenham have made Iago Flaque’s loan move from Juventus permanent, and immediately loaned him out to Southampton for the rest of the season.

The Spain under-21 midfielder has impressed in a temporary deal at White Hart Lane and Harry Redknapp has moved to secure the prospect’s services.

Falque has made six first-team appearances this season so far, mainly in the Europa League, and has been farmed out to The Saints to get more experience.

“I’m very happy to be here at Southampton, and I am looking forward to training with my new teammates who have proved this season that they are very talented,” the youngster stated to The Championship side’s official website.

“I hope that I can help the team to great things this season.”

Meanwhile, Southampton boss Nigel Adkins feels that Falque will be an asset to the south-coast club, and hopes he can help the club back to the Premier League.

“He’s a very exciting player and I’m pleased that we’ve got him on board and I think the supporters will be excited by what he can do on the pitch.

“Like many of our players he’s a player who can play everywhere and he’s someone who can play on the left, on the right and in the number 10 position behind the striker, so he’s a talented footballer and one who I’m sure is going to excite everybody.

“Tottenham rate him highly and have loaned him out to ourselves where he will become another addition to the players that we’ve got to give us that opportunity to get back into the Premier League,” he concluded.

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By Gareth McKnight

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Real Madrid boss Jose Mourinho’s inflammatory post-match accusations could be subjected to action by Barcelona.Mourinho was left enraged following Pepe’s sending off in the 61st minute in Wednesday’s Champions League semi-final first leg, which also led to his dismissal to the stands and an ensuing 2-0 defeat to Barcelona at the Bernabeu.

Reigning Spanish champions Barcelona take a healthy advantage heading into the return fixture against their arch rivals at Camp Nou next Tuesday.

And the Catalan club is now deliberating whether it can refer Mourinho’s stinging post-match statement, in which he declared Barcelona constantly received favourable refereeing decisions to the UEFA Disciplinary Commission.

A statement on the club’s official site read: “Barca’s legal department will study the declarations made by Jose Mourinho following his team’s 0-2 defeat at the Bernabeu on Wednesday night to determine whether to refer them to UEFA.”

Mourinho claimed Barcelona were being afforded preferential treatment by match officials in his press conference after the loss, drawing parallels with his experiences as then-manager of Chelsea in the 2008/09 Champions League season.

“But I just do not understand why Barcelona always receives the help of the referee. All my life I will be asking myself this question, and one day I hope to receive an answer,” Mourinho said.

“I don’t understand why Barcelona have this power. It happened two years ago to Chelsea, almost to my Inter last year, and also to Arsenal this year.”

“Why do the opponents of Barcelona always have a man sent off? Where does this power come from? Maybe it is to give more publicity to UNICEF, maybe because of the power of (Spanish federation president Jose Angel) Villar in UEFA.”

Opposite Pep Guardiola refused to be drawn into a war of words and instead focused on his side’s winning performance.

Summer signing Stephen Hunt is hopeful of finally making his Wolves debut around the end of October, as he continues his recovery from a serious foot injury.

The 29-year-old Republic of Ireland midfielder moved to Molineux from Hull City earlier this summer, but has been forced to watch the start of the new Premier League season.

However, he is making progress in his recovery, telling the Express & Star:"I've been out on the pitch jogging for the first time since being here.

"It was the first time I'd set foot on the green grass and it was only a slow pace, but it all helps.

"When I'm back in full training, hopefully I can get a full two weeks then and see where I am after that. The next step will be to get a pre-season under my belt.

"Then there's another international break in October and hopefully by the time those games come around, I shouldn't be too far away.

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"Hopefully I'll be ready to play in the first team somewhere around then.

"If it has to be after the international games in October, then so be it, because when I come back, I want to be fit for the whole season."Subscribe to Football FanCast News Headlines by Email

One of the key ingredients for a solid defensive record is consistency. The players and the goalkeeper need to know and understand each other in order to perform effectively, they need to communicate, know what each other will be doing at any individual moment and where their strengths and weaknesses lie. With that in mind you wouldn’t be surprised to read that Arsenal have turned out a total of twenty different back fours this season, some of whom don’t even play for the club any more. However, despite what many people think, Arsenal’s defensive record has been improving dramatically since the beginning of the season. The number of goals they have conceded on the road has been poor but you have to remember that most of those goals came in three games where they conceded a combined total of fifteen goals away at Chelsea, Man Utd and Blackburn. Apart from that Arsenal have only conceded nine goals all season and have conceded the third least number of goals at home.

You could put this down to a number of different things. Thomas Vermaelen being back is a massive boost, every game he seems to play better and better, but he has not played the whole season. Laurent Koscielny is twice the player he was last season; also Per Mertesacker seems to be adapting quickly to life in the Premier League. However the largest contributing factor has to be the rise and rise of Wojicech Szczesny. His performances are not necessarily a surprise to many Arsenal fans who, on his performances last year, always knew that he was going to be good. However the performances of Fabianski and Mannone in the Champions League game against Olympiakos were a stark reminder of just how far Arsenal has come from the brief period last year when Szczesny was yet to break in to the first team. The young Pole’s rise has been nothing short of meteoric and the confidence the defence have in him as well as his own self-belief underpins the defensive performances of Arsenal at the moment. People might say that Vermaelen is the key but, as brilliant as the Belgian is, that night at Olympiakos proved just how vital Szczesny is for the Gunners.

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He is far from the finished article, and he definitely has a touch of the Jens Lehmann about him. By that I mean his eccentricities will get him in to trouble at some point. His penchant for dummying onrushing strikers when he has the ball instead of just clearing, whilst impressive, will surely end in disaster at some point. Just as it did for Lehmann against Mark Viduka in 2004 when Jens was caught just the wrong side of being calm against a striker with good reactions. However these are minor issues that he can iron out of his game and, for Arsenal fans, it must be nice to have a keeper whose problem lies in his excess confidence rather than being totally devoid of any self belief whatsoever as Fabianski and Almunia seem to be.

One thing that Arsenal fans may be surprised to hear however is that Szczesny currently has a better clean sheet to game ratio than any Arsenal goalkeeper who has appeared for Arsenal on more than fifty occasions (i.e. not including goalkeepers who have played 2 carling cup games and kept clean sheets only to never play again). This may well surprise Arsenal fans who may be struggling to remember any clean sheets that their team have kept however there have been a fair few this year and although Arsenal’s defence performed far from admirably last year they tended to collapse and concede lots of goals in the odd game rather than concede every game.

For such a young goalkeeper to have played so well this year is truly remarkable. Whilst the £20m David de Gea’s performances have been excused by his arrival from Spain Arsenal could point out that only 18 months ago Szczesny was plying his trade at Brentford. It may be English football but he has had to adapt to play against some of the best strikers in the world on a regular basis. Something that United’s Goalkeeper knows only too well. For Szczesny to have collected the Arsenal ‘Player of the Month’ award, as voted by the fans, on multiple occasions this season you get the feeling that he must be doing something right. Anybody in a position to take that sort of accolade away from Robin van Persie with his current form has to be.

For more Arsenal news and stories follow me on Twitter @H_Mackay

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Recently we have seen players getting into trouble for things they have done on the social networking website Twitter. In January of this year former Liverpool player Ryan Babel was fined £10,000 for posting a photo of referee Howard Webb in a Manchester United shirt. The post was intended as a joke and a reaction to decisions that were made in the match featuring Liverpool and Manchester United refereed by Webb.

Within the last few days, Carlton Cole faces a charge for a comment he made on his Twitter account. Cole made the comment during the recent international friendly between England and Ghana. Cole tweeted “Immigration has surrounded the Wembley premises! I knew it was a trap! Hahahaha. The only way to get out safely is to wear an England jersey and paint your face w/ the St. George’s flag!”

It appears that charges for the use of Twitter are becoming more common and it is certainly something players will need to be vigilant of. The real issue here is who should be policing the use of Twitter, the club the player/s are contracted to, the players themselves or the FA?

At the moment it seems like the FA are taking control – but in the first case can matters of this nature be kept in house by the club? Is there any scope for an outright ban on Twitter or would that make matters worse?

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I think there is also a role that can be played by both the FA and the club in the form of education. It would be useful to everyone if the FA can release some information on what sort of things are likely to be investigated and what sort of things are just harmless banter. The club can let their players know that they should be careful on what they write on Twitter and again outline what sort of things the players should aim to stay away from.

Once players have a clear understanding on what they should and should not write then they can regulate themselves; if they then step out of those guidelines and get fined by the FA they really only have themselves to blame. But as Ipswich Town player Billy Clark recently found out, it’s not always a case of comments that can get you into trouble with the FA that you have to be wary of. Ipswich Town manager Paul Jewell recently made the decision to not offer Clark a new contract beyond the end of this season. Clark foolishly made a public tweet directed towards a fan to suggest he was glad to be leaving and after hearing about this Jewell has informed Clark that if he feels this way then he should leave immediately.

Twitter is a wonderful tool and used the right way can bring players, fans and the club closer together – but it should be respected and used sensibly.

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Chelsea boss Carlo Ancelotti has quashed speculation linking him with a move for Benfica left-back Fabio Coentrao.

Rumours continue to circulate about a possible transfer to Real Madrid for Ashley Cole but Ancelotti has reiterated his desire to keep the former Arsenal star at Stamford Bridge.

When asked about the Coentrao rumours, Ancelotti said: "It is not true, totally rubbish."

However, the Blues boss has confirmed that he expects the £18million capture of Benfica's Brazil international Ramires to be sealed shortly, adding:"Ramires is, until now, a Benfica player. When he is here, I can speak about him, not now.

"I don't want to speak about Ramires. When Ramires signs a contract for Chelsea, he will sign. This is the same for other players. I read a lot of names in the newspapers."

Michael Ballack, Joe Cole and Juliano Belletti have all left Chelsea since the end of last season, while the only high-profile arrival has been Yossi Benayoun, and Ancelotti admitted:"For us, after a fantastic season, it was very difficult to change this squad.

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"We were totally agreed to maintain this squad. To put some young players in this squad from our academy, this was our aim. After a fantastic season, we could repeat the same season this year with these players.

"I think that the teams that can win the title will be the same as last year, including, obviously, Man City, because they've bought fantastic players."Subscribe to Football FanCast News Headlines by Email

The groans could probably be heard two hundred miles away, in the studio where the two balls had just been plucked out of the proverbial hat. In the third round of the FA Cup, both Manchester teams had not been afforded a nice easy introduction to the season’s competition. No, the Cup holders would be playing the League Champions. Again.

I’ve no doubt plenty of fans would have been overjoyed at the news, or at least bullish, defiant, confident even. Bravado was much in evidence on the social media and message board streams. Bring it on, and all that. For United, a chance for revenge, the 6-1 home league humiliation and cup defeat of last season still fresh in the mind. For City, a chance to turn the screw further, to make up more ground after decades of lagging behind with a cigarette in hand, out of breath, the kid at the back of the cross-country run.

Or as Franny Lee rather optimistcally tweeted, a chance to end United’s season in early January.

Plenty like me however, are anything but overjoyed. Many United fans would like nothing more than to avoid a meeting with City right now, for obvious reasons. But on the other hand, City will still have plenty to fear too. This will hardly be another walk in the park for City, it will almost certainly be close, where any team could win. And as I have commented before, I hate derby days with a passion. I would be perfectly happy to never play United more than twice a season, even if in some hypothetical world they became utter dross whilst City ruled the world. I’d still hate it. Football is supposed to be about days like these, the nerves, the tension, the passion, and the upside of victory is greater than against any other side. But to be honest, it just makes me ill and ruins my appetite.

But that’s not the main reason – it’s not about me and my delicate stomach. There is of course the possibility that the tie could go to a replay. And the last thing City needed was having to put out their strongest team for the third round of the FA Cup once, never mind twice. In the period around the match, City must play Liverpool three times. This is coming just after the ever-busy Christmas programme. Then there’s the small matter of a game against Spurs, and the inconvenience of the Toure brothers jetting off to the African Cup of Nations for up to two months (ok, the inconvenience of Yaya Toure jetting off to the African Cup of Nations). City might have strength in depth, but their squad is the same size as everyone else’s and they are only a couple of injuries away from having plenty of problems.

This is not to moan at the fixture congestion of course, it is the price of success, merely to point out that a home tie with a League Two side would have been a lot easier for City to cope with. After all, Liverpool have a straightforward home cup tie to deal with, so will have the opportunity to rest players for their semi-final dates with City. Still, having to play two games in three days didn’t seem to do Liverpool or City much harm the other week.

And United could do without it too. Yes, they managed to skilfully avoid the inconvenience of two January Carling Cup ties, but have just lost Hernandez through injury, whilst the likes of Owen and Berbatov already seek treatment. A home tie to Macclesfield (or Chelmsford) would have suited them just as much. The cup defeat to Crystal Palace perhaps suggested that Ferguson doesn’t have the strength of depth that he had hoped. The new-wave of youth products set to break through to the first team don’t appear to be the real deal just yet. As Ferdinand succumbs to the ravages of time, Evra continues through a run of poor form, the Da Silva brothers appear to be made of balsa wood and an extra Manchester derby is probably not what the doctor ordered. At least United won’t lose anyone important for duties in Africa.

The problem is that neither manager can afford to play a weakened side – they could get away with a few changes and everything would be rosy, but get it wrong and the results would be disastrous and the fans not happy. It will be a difficult balancing act for Mancini and Ferguson to decide what players to pick.

It’s a bit harsh perhaps to view such a big tie in such a cynical and unromantic light. A tie that raises the eyebrows of all viewers when the teams are drawn – the sort of tie that makes a cup draw such a thrilling event, that makes the third round FA Cup draw one of the highlights of the season. It’s the magic of the cup and all that. And the losers can concentrate on the league. But in the cold light of day, it’s a distraction during the busiest time of the season that both teams could probably do without.

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The WAGs of Premier League footballers get just as much attention as the players themselves these days. There was the whole John Terry v Wayne Bridge incident last season, which saw Vanessa Perroncel coming between the ex-Chelsea teammates. This season we’ve seen Manchester United striker Wayne Rooney hit the front pages for his actions off the pitch that will have put him in the doghouse with Coleen, which is exactly where Tottenham’s Peter Crouch finds himself after cheating on Abbey Clancy.

Given the increased status of football WAGs we thought it was only right and proper to put the spotlight on the best of the best, the Lionel Messi’s and Cristiano Ronaldo’s of the WAG world. They’re showcased in all their glory in our countdown of the Top Ten Premier League WAGs. You won’t be surprised to know that Rooney’s recent bits on the side didn’t make the list, but who did make the list?

Click on the beautiful Daniela Martins to see the top 10 Premier League WAGS

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