After a hard day’s negotiations between United and City, Dimitar Berbatov is back with his national side Bulgaria at Vassil Levski stadium in Sofia  training for their World Cup Group Eight qualifying soccer match against Montenegro on Wednesday. Manchester United’s expensive new acquisition will be a new dimension in Alex Ferguson’s arsenal, althouhg it was intrioguing that Manchester City said they would have paid for both Berbatov and Robinho had the bids been accepted which is a partnership that might have produced some free flowing football, but alas will be unlikely to happen now.

Now that soccer has its own genuine brand of royalty, it begs the serious question why our own Royal family has not joined in the general enthusiasm for buying up a football club? Windsor and Eton are currently languishing 11th in the southern division. They actually have quite an ancient history, being formed in 1892 as a merger of Windsor Phoenix and Windsor St Albans…

Bet Chelsea

Be afraid. Be very afraid. The influence of the great Luis Felipe Scolari on Chelsea was manifest in the opening minutes of the new season and as Portsmouth found out carried on through the full 90 minutes of glorious soccer. Nor was this a flash in the pan. Suddenly this team had been told what to do, just as they had when Jose Mourinho took over and in that first season had Damien Duff and Arjen Robben dancing down the wings.

Instruction one: Let the ball do the work. One touch and move. Be in place to support the man with the ball. Know the man will be in the space.

Instruction two: Hunt in packs so you can win back possession on the run and harass opponent’s attacks

Instruction three: Do not give the ball away by trying to dribble into opponents. Play into the space

Instruction four: If you are attacking you don’t need to defend

Instruction five: Use the wings

Item five was especially a weakness with Chelsea under both Mourinho and Grant, where tatacks arrived from an angle of 45 degrees at speed in the hope of wrong footing an opponent instead of making the byline and crossing from 90 degrees, the more so with a centreforwrad still to come back in Didier Drogba.

This was a stunning victory and achieved without Drogba, Michael Essien and Michal Ballack who went off early, who many might say are Chelsea’s three best players

The sheer greed of the FA and UEFA for that matter beggars belief. What other national sport would opt for Macdonalds as a sponsor? Sorry their sponsor in the community, which sounds even worse? Sure it is a good thing that 900 kids got an away day to play at Wembley. And in moderation, technically speaking, there is probably not much wrong with supersizing half a dozen big macs and a few loads of fries on the weigh to the match., after all you are only watching so as long as you are not too fat to sit in your seat. Meanwhile Fabio and his employer’s are shovelling the money and he moans that there are not many English players playing in the Premier League. A connection somewhere?????

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Carlos Tevez holds the Community Shield up for fans. The best we can say is that at least Tevez deserved something on the day on which 0-0 hardly lit up expectations for the new season and a decision that went down to some poor penalties from Portsmouth. Manchester United looked good and well oiled but lacked the cutting edge that the injured Cristiano Ronaldo and the sickly Wayne Rooney offer. They may be fortunate that they have a slow start to the season with only two games in August and three in September thanks to internationals and the Super Cup against Uefa Cup winners Zenit St Petersburg in Monaco, another piece of debatable show boating to fund the coffers of soccer’s overbloated bureaucracy.

Charlie ‘Big Bets’ Bracewell is a bond trader. He works in Canary Wharf. His a mathematical genius who has and is developing strategies for soccer betting online.

“Well, that is very kind of you old boy, though genius is perhaps a little far fetched…I just like to test the probabilities and see if we can’t win a few bob”

Do you make more out of bonds or gambling? “It is not gambling old chap, it is just a bit of fun. So are the bonds.”

Who do you support? “Well nobody really, not unless they win me money!”

Favourite song? “I Did It My Way - the Frank Sinatra version”

Favourite TV programme? “Match of the Day”

Favourite Movie: “Pulp Fiction”

Favourite Book: Luke Reinhardt’s The Diceman

Favourite Quote: “Money won is twice as sweet as money earned - from the Colour of Money film”

Favourite vice: “A good malt whisky”!

And? “Shhhhhhhh”.

Best bet ever? “Spurs 4 Chelsea 4. A complete fluke really. I only did it as an experiment with eight unexpected bets because I felt something unusual would happen. It paid 125/1″

Any other gambling interests? “Tennis is getting interesting but thye mathematics are different. A little poker, if anyone is brave enough to play with me these days?”

Betting on football friendlies has perhaps not enjoyed the cachet that league and cup games carry, but there is some good money to be made this week while the players work off their flab and swap the suntan oil for grease. Friendlies are about pride and as Barcelona showed against Hibernian last week, pride means 6-0, and as Chelsea showed in Macau pride means 7-0. Calling those are long odds but a quadruple this week on Arsenal, Barcelona, Liverpool and Marseille all to win then £10 pays out £220.

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