Archive for September, 2009

This week we try to predict results from two matches involving fierce local rivals: the Glasgow and Rio de Janeiro derbies. We also feature matches from La Liga and a top of the table clash from the Premier League. This week’s guest predictor is Niall, who is a West Ham fan and a regular contributor to our website. Hope he can do better than his team!

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This post gives explanations of two more footballing clichés. You can find many more examples by going to our football cliché page here.

To run your socks off | Listen to the cliché here

This cliché is used when a team or an individual player is seen to work very hard during a game. The expression is often used with the verb ‘work’ as in he worked his socks off throughout the game. Indeed, this phrase is synonymous with certain types of battling midfield players such as Steven Gerrard or formerly Roy Keane who often run their socks off to get their teams back into a game. If a team works their socks off it means that they battled hard and did not give up. To work your socks off. continue

In this week’s quiz we test your knowledge about the Bundesliga. Click on the link below to try the online version (with answers)

Which team will win this season’s Bundesliga title? Choose one of the teams from the selection below or add your own choice. Don’t forget to tell us why.

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This week’s main report looks at the Bundesliga with Hans guiding us through the German league. The transcript of the report is below and includes vocabulary in bold which is explained at the foot of the post.

Listen to the report here

Transcript
Hans: Hello and welcome to the Bundesliga. My name is Hans and I’m delighted this season because my team SC Freiburg are back in the top flight after several seasons in the second league. However, as always with the Bundesliga, everybody is talking about Bayern München.
continue

The Bundesliga dominates our show this week with German correspondent Hans looking at all the top stories from the German League. We also preview the second set of matches in the Champions League. Come along to the site at languagecaster.com to read about these and many other footballing stories.

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PREDICTION

This week’s featured match is the Ruhr derby between Dortmund and Schalke.

FOOTBALL EXPRESSION

This week’s English for football expression is ‘sleeping giant’ which means that someone or something has not yet demonstrated the full extent of its powers. In football we often use this phrase to refer to a big club that maybe has not performed as well as it used to do but has lots of potential to do so again in the future. This week, Alex Ferguson, the Manchester United manager called Wolves a sleeping giant because it used to be the top team in England in the 1950s and after some years in the lower divisions is slowly recovering though not yet to its former glory. Sleeping giant.

This week’s QUIZ QUESTION:

What was the last German team to play in a Champions League final?

a) Borussia Dortmund

b) Bayern Munich

c) Hamburg

d) Bayer Leverkusen

Answer next week.

Last week’s answer was c) Inter need to win the scudetto title 3 more times before they can have another star on their shirts.

This week’s POLL

This week’s poll asks which team do you think will win Serie A. Click here admin@languagecaster.com if you want to have your say on our weekly podcast.

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Come along to our online shop and browse books and DVDs related to football and English language teaching and learning.

For all students of the beautiful game

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This week languagecaster.com takes a look at the Bundesliga with Hans our German football correspondent.

• Read our football news review in the good, the bad and the ugly
• Check out a new football expression in English for Football
• Follow the weekly predictions battle between Damon and Damian in the Predictions competition
• For learners of English check out our Football Language Resources page with:
• Football glossary (a huge collection of football vocabulary, football cliches and football phrases)
• Worksheets and transcripts from previous podcasts
  

A good start to the season for Spanish giants, a 15 minute game in J-League, and more trouble for under-fire Argentinian manager, Maradona – it seems diamonds aren’t forever. Also, potential financial problems at Queens Park Rangers, and allegations of players being racially abused all get a look in on this week’s The Good, the Bad and the Ugly Vocabulary support can be found for the words in bold at the foot of the post.

Good

 Real Madrid’s stars featured in their latest win: Ronaldo, playing on the left, and Kaka both found the net as Real overcame a 10-man Villareal to maintain their 100% record. But not to be outdone, Barcelona, last year’s champions of Spain and Europe, also won with a 4-1 thrashing of Racing Santander away – Messi got a brace after Ibrahimovic opened the scoring with a typical far-post header. A good start for the two favourites for the Spanish crown. Can anyone stop them? continue

Two huge games from the Bundesliga feature in this week’s predictions battle, including the Ruhr derby. We also predict the results from the second set of matches in the Champions League group stage. This week’s guest predictor is Peter, who is not a football fan at all, despite watching many Celtic games when he grew up. Read more about why Peter doesn’t like football here.

eter

Which team will win this season’s Serie A title? Choose one of the teams from the selection below or add your own choice. Don’t forget to tell us why.