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Week 30: The good, the bad and the ugly – 2009 Carling Cup final

Carling Cup victory, poor refereeing, Ronaldo’s comeback and some slightly over-exaggerated TV commentary all feature on this week’s good, the bad and the ugly on languagecaster’s football podcast. Click on the links below to find out more on all of these stories. Explanations of key vocabulary (in bold) can be found at the foot of the page.

Good

It was good for Manchester United as they take Tottenham’s Carling Cup crown last Sunday, winning on penalties. Ben Foster, Manchester’s second-choice goalkeeper was the hero for the Premier League leaders, saving in the penalty shoot-out, using an i-pod to watch videos of Tottenham’s penalty takers. Very smart. Manchester United are on course for an amazing quintuple – five cups. They have the World Club Cup, The Carling Cup and are in the hunt for the FA Cup, The Champions League and the Premier League title.Good for Brazilian star Ronaldo as he played his first game in more than a year for his new side Corinthians in a Brazilian Cup game yesterday. The 32 year old got through the final 20 minutes of the match unscathed but received a black eye after the game as the press battled to get an interview with him. Good to have Ronaldo back.

Bad

Not too good however for one of Ronaldo’s former teams, Spanish side Barcelona, who were beaten 4-3 by Atletico Madrid last weekend. This latest defeat means that the Catalan’s lead at the top of La Liga is now only 4 points after Real Madrid won again – this time against Espanyol. A mid-season dip in form or a spectacular crash? We’ll soon see.

Bad refereeing by Stuart Atwell in the Wigan vs West Ham match ruined the game, allowing it to become a bad-tempered encounter. Two harsh yellows on Carlton Cole saw the West Ham striker receive his marching orders, while Scott Parker and Lucas Neil were both lucky to escape more serious punishment for clear dissent and an awful tackle respectively. Then Cattermole for Wigan was shown a straight red after a bad tackle on Parker: the Hammers player was guilty of extreme play acting, rolling around the floor as if in agony, and maybe influencing the referee. A bad performance from the young referee. A display that will surely be used in all referee training DVDs on how not to referee a match.

John Motson claiming that Robbie Keane is the best all round player in the Premier League. What? The veteran BBC TV commentator picked the ex-Liverpool striker’s performance in the Tottenham v Middlesbrough game as the standout player. Think about it – Robbie Keane, the best all round player in the Premier League… bizarre.

Ugly

For my ugly this week I am returning to the much-troubled Uruguayan League – remember it was suspended twice before due to crowd trouble – well, this time thanks to clubs not paying their players there is a strike, meaning that no games took place this week. Ugly indeed.

Vocabulary

Here are some of the words from the good, the bad and the ugly section from this week’s show. You can download the podcast here

Second-choice: Not a first-team player, does not usually play every week

Quintuple: Connected to the number 5; Here it means five trophies

Unscathed: To not get hurt, to remain unhurt

A dip in form: To not play as well as before, to go through a bad patch

Encounter: In football this refers to a match or game

Harsh: Too strict, not deserved

To receive his marching orders: To be sent off, to get a red card

Dissent: To speak in a bad manner to a referee, to abuse a referee

To be out for a year: To have not played for a year because of injury

Standout player: The best player on the pitch, most important player

To be suspended: To be stopped, there were no games played because of the strike

Welcome to the website that helps students interested in football improve their English language skills. Soccer fans can enhance these skills with lots of free language resources: a weekly podcast, football phrases, explanations of football vocabulary, football cliches, worksheets, quizzes and much more at languagecaster.com.

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The Good, The Bad, The Ugly