Is Ronaldo this Generations Greatest Player..??

Cristiano Ronaldo won his 3^rd ballon d’or this year cementing his place as one of the world’s greatest footballer’s, and potentially the best of all time. 

Born on the 5^th of February 1985 in Madeira Portugal, Cristiano Ronaldo has played for Sporting Lisbon, Manchester United and is currently at Real Madrid.  In 2003 Manchester United paid 12 million pound to sign him when he was only 18 years old, showing incredible faith in the talents of such a young player.  Since his Manchester United move he has gone on to break many records and scored some incredible goals. With Real Madrid he has broken the record for the most hat-tricks in the la liga, scoring 23 in total more than any other player in the league’s history.

Is Ronaldo the greatest player of all-time..??

Before he played for great teams like Manchester United, Real Madrid and Sporting Lisbon he played for Madeira as a child, the local team in the town where he grew up. When he was 12 he moved 600 miles to Lisbon to play for Sporting Lisbon’s youth team and some of his team mates made fun of his Madeiran accent.

Real Madrid signed him for a record breaking £80million transfer from Manchester United but that record was recently broken when the same team paid £85 million for Gareth Bale.

 

When Ronaldo was at Manchester United he had a strong relationship with former boss Sir Alex Ferguson. Ferguson said in an interview that ‘Ronaldo is the greatest player I ever worked with’ praise indeed from a manager who has worked with players such as Beckham, Scholes, Giggs and Cantona.

 

Sir Alex described Ronaldo as the best he's ever worked with

When Ronaldo was at Manchester United he won the Premier League Title, the Champions League , Community Shield, FA Cup, Club World Cup, as well as individual awards the ballon d’or, golden boot, and pfa player of the year.

At Real Madrid he has won the La Liga, the Copa del Rey, and recently added 'la decima' Real Madrid's tenth European Cup success. 

Ronaldo has won everything there is to win but the only thing is missing is success at International level with Portugal.  The only blip on the superstar’s record is perhaps the 2004 European Championship Finals where Portugal lost one nil to Greece in the final - made even more disappointing due to the fact the tournament was held in Portugal, Ronaldo’s home country

Ronaldo recently turned 30 years old, still at the peak of his career who knows how many more ballon d'or's this incredible player could potentially win.





by Jamie Forrester

 

Evan's Heroics Can't Save Larbert U-13's

Earlier this week, Larbert High School’s U-13 football squad were in for a challenge as they were facing the dominate Graham High school who were sitting comfortably at the top of the table. Larbert played a strong squad but were missing key players and had to bring in reserves. Larbert were always going to struggle but with Larbert’s goal keeper Evan Taylor on scintillating form they managed to keep themselves in the game. In the end Graham showed why they are a performance school winning 6-0 keeping them comfortably at the top of the table.

The game started brightly with Graham creating many chances but some great early saves from Evan Taylor denied the performance school from scoring early on.

 It wasn’t long before Graham struck the net for the first time when they scored a standard 6 yard tap-in into the bottom left hand corner, un-saveable for Evan Taylor.

Graham bagged a few more goals before the half making it 4-0 at half time.

Graham make it 2-0 after a well taken penalty.  It was a tough night for the U-13's despite heroics from Evan Taylor

The Larbert midfield in the second half had clearly given themselves a shake, beginning to cope with the pace of the Graham High attack. The hard work and team work of Larbert was starting to come into play and the boys were creating more chances than the first half.

 

Graham took this as a warning and stepped up their game again scoring 2 more goals, which the keeper couldn’t prevent. Evan Taylor was on top of his game and if it wasn’t for him the score could have been a lot greater for Graham.

 

So at the end of the match Graham had earned 3 points, showing their dominance and why they are a performance school.

Despite the fact of conciding 6 goals we’ve given the man of the match to Larbert’s keeper Evan Taylor for pulling of some great saves and denying Graham time and time again.

 

 

 

by Cammy Dick

Thierry Henry, Arsenal's All-Time Great Gunner

Thierry Henry’s incredible career began in the Paris suburb of Les Ulis. Thierry was born in August 1977 in Les Ulis; the son of immigrant parents from French oversees regions in the Caribbean Thierry bonded with other children in the neighbourhood through football. 

His abilities as a youngster were impressive enough to earn him a spot on CO Les Ulis youth club as a 7-year-old. A 15 year old Henry joined formidable French club Monaco FC in 1992 and was granted a first team place after only one season with the club.  Henry would stay with the French club for seven years and was an integral part of the squad that won the 1996-1997 ‘Ligue 1’ title.

A young Thierry Henry plying his trade at Monaco 

In 1999 Thierry Henry decided to leave Monaco and join defending Italian Champions Juventus. He had a disappointing season on the wing, not his preferred position, and didn’t reach the heights of his Monaco performances. After only one with Monaco season Henry joined Arsenal for £11 million in 1999 where he would go onto become a club cult hero and Arsenal’s all-time top goal scorer.

It was at Arsenal that Henry made his name as a world class player. Despite the club struggling in the Premier League when he arrived Henry quickly emerged as an incredible player for Arsenal and became the club’s top goal-scorer for almost every season. Under long time mentor and former Monaco coach Arsene Wenger, Henry became a prolific striker and Arsenal’s all time goal scorer with 228 goals in all competitions.

 

Thierry Henry is firmly established as an Arsenal legend

The Frenchman won two League Titles and three F.A cups with the Gunners and was runner-up for the FIFA World Player of the Year twice. Henry spent his final two seasons with Arsenal as club captain leading them to the UEFA Champions League Final where they were narrowly beaten 2-1 by European heavyweights Barcelona.

 

In June 2007 after eight years at Arsenal Henry transferred to Barcelona for a fee of £24 million. In 2009 he was an integral part of the club’s historic treble when they won La Liga, the Copa Del Ray and the UEFA Champions League. He returned to Arsenal on loan for two months in 2012.  In 2013 Henry went to MLS club New York Red Bulls and won the MLS Supporters shield.

 

Henry enjoyed incredible success with the French national team also, winning the 1998 FIFA World Cup UEFA, Euro 2000 Championships and 2003 FIFA confederations Cup. He retired from International football in 2010 World Cup.

 

1 World Cup and 1 European Championship, not a bad return for an Intenatioanl career

Henry married English model Nicole Merry in 2003 and had a daughter with her, but they divorced in 2007. Henry was also one of the top commercially marketed footballers ever ranked ninth in the world in 2006.

Thierry Henry is now retired and working for Sky Sports. Perhaps in the future he may make a return as Arsenal manager.

 

 

 

by Mitchell Wallace