www.Go To The Mountain - Musings of a Potential Guru

Chelsea won the EPL League title because they are the best team over a whole season. They played as a team and they have a very good manager in Antonio Conte. They were in terrible shape but when Conte arrived he inherited the team, made clever tweaks to players (Victor Moses has been a transformation) and the system (3-4-3) and added important players (N'Golo Kante) and he invigorated Eden Hazard and Diego Costa. An excellent manager always make use of limited and available resources to achieve goals. Chelsea were also fortunate with injuries and have the advantage of using mostly the same players without going through major rotation. Not being in the Champions League helps as Leicester City did the same last season. Next season they will need reinforcement. Congratulations to Chelsea and their fans. Now for the rest and their last match of the season. If you see people feeling lost during weekends, it is probably due to the end of the soccer season. Arsenal v Everton - The G...

EPL is indeed the most competitive soccer league. It is not just so easy to win the league title. You could see the smaller teams or teams at the bottom holding or even beating the bigger and richer teams at their own game. That is the beauty of it. Chelsea have more or less done it with that 3-0 in over Middlesborough sending them down to the Championship and Tottenham's 0-1 collapse at West Ham may have just ended the fight. The attention now turns to who gets into third and fourth and which is the last team to be relegated and also the top scorer chart. EVerton's Romelu Lukaku has 24 goals from 35 matches (ratio: 0.68), Tottenham's Harry Kane has 21 from 27 games (ratio: 0.77) and Diego Costa got 20 from 33 (ratio:0.60). Kane is the most lethal in that sense regardless who tops.  There are two to four matches left depending on the team but all soccer fans have two weeks left to savour and three months to lick their wounds if their team falters or fall short. Let's s...

This is why we watch soccer! Action and goals!!! http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/international/2017-05-02/liverpools-emre-can-registers-late-premier-league-goal-of-the-season-entry-but-is-it-the-best/1668504 Cristiano Ronaldo continued his incredible goal-scoring prowess against Athletico Madrid with another hattrick. This man is a goal machine and I wonder if there will be one as prolific that we can ever find again! You can't say he has scored many because La Liga is easier because he has done that with Manchester United as a young man. This man's physique and fitness is like that of the late Bruce Lee, a man mountain warm marbled muscles. He scores with his left foot, right foot, he leaps and arches himself in the air like a salmon, he scores from wonderful free kicks, dribbles and crosses. The most complete player ever perhaps. He is a man obsessed to be the best ever soccer player. There have been times often, where his narcissistic side were there to see. So too hi...

Real Madrid 2 Barcelona 3, Man-Of-The-Match (MOTM) - Lionel Messi. What else is new? This is why he is the best player in the world. I even dare say of all time and in history! Messi not only delivered with two goals with the winning one at the death and Ramos sent off was for a bad two legged tackle. Messi was even left bloodied with blood pouring out from the mouth. That was the warrior spirit in a small frame. There is little adjectives to add.  Back home on the FAS election, it is a sad day for Singapore soccer. At one time in the 60s, were were fourth only behind Myanmar, Iran and Japan in Asia. Now our position in FIFA ranking is a joke. We were playing friendlies with Cambodia and Timor Leste and struggled playing the rest of the Asean countries. In other words, we are in total decline while others shave improved. If the top is right, we will go places. That is the whole point. Only those with the best interest with Singapore soccer at heart should run the place. Otherwis...

It was a week of master classes.  Tottenham displayed almost perfect soccer with total domination and control over Bournemouth that at one point you actually fear for the visitors well-being. Tottenham Hotspurs were actually rampant with their precision and incision, flicks and one-twos and the usual suspects of Dele Alli, Harry Kane and Christian Eriksen and the resurgent Dembele who opened accounts. It was their seventh consecutive victories in the top flight for the first time in 50 years! Mauricio Pochettino's team performed a great consummate attacking show of force. Even Korean Son Heung-min has been irresistible of late. Spurs' imperious form has kept Chelsea under pressure and looking over their shoulders. The soccer dished out by Pochettino's Spurs was fluent and the attacking throughout incessant. Harry Kane got his 25th goal in all competition but it was the season's 20th making him only the 4th such striker who has scored more than 20 goals a season for th...

EPL Seven matches to go, for a few teams six and the season is over. Chelsea cemented their position and the title is still theirs to lose and the moment they falter, Tottenham will snatch it equally deservedly. Liverpool may still make it to the Champions League if the others fall by the wayside. So too Manchester City, Manchester United and Arsenal. Chelsea have a tough one coming up at Old Trafford  and Tottenham may draw closer but have their own challenge hosting Bournemouth, Liverpool have their own banana skin at the Hawthorns, City will be visitors to a tough Southampton, Manchester United have their own demons to conquer as they host Chelsea while Arsenal visits Middlesborough.  The bottom end is equally interesting. It is no less excruciating as the battles continued till doomsday cometh. Arsenal are losing it at the most crucial time especially when they have just been thrashed 3-0 by Crystal Palace. No mean feat for Sam Allardyce and the worst ever situation for...

First instinct. I should always go by first instinct. When the last weekend kicked off with Liverpool v Everton, I looked at the injured players and form from both sides and penned in 3-1 in Liverpool's favour then  weighed in the possible tired pair of Firmino and Coutinho and revised it to 2-1. It is like golf putting, go for your first instinct. Arsene Wenger ' s Arsenal and Pep Guardiola's Manchester City did themselves no favours when they drew 2-2. Yes, City showed attacking fervour when they drew first blood and led twice and yes, the Gunners responded twice to level and that is character. Arsene Wenger is a respected and great manager and  you can't take anything away from him just like you can't take anything away from Leicester City. Wenger came from Nagoya Grampus Eight and no one have heard about him and yet he came, he saw and he conquered. He introduced things to Arsenal and to the English Premier League that no one ever did. He changed the diet and...