Leather and Glass

As Juan mentioned earlier, we passed TLOCA's three-year anniversary last month (January 15th, to be exact). According to this website, the traditional anniversary gift for the third year is leather, and the modern gift is crystal/glass. So if anyone would like to send us a pair of the pants that David Bentley undoubtedly wears around his house and any part of Robin van Persie's body, that should satisfy both the traditional and the modern gift requirements.

To business. First, regarding Liverpool's two new strikers: (1) I'm excited to see this play out, and (2) how on earth is Andy Carroll worth 12.5 million pounds more than Luis Suarez? I mean, I understand the whole "he's English and he's really tall" argument, but so is Peter Crouch. I also recognize that they have extremely different playing styles, but I would take Suarez over Carroll any day. Eighty-one goals in 110 appearances for Ajax? Sure, it's the Dutch league, but throw a fine World Cup performance on top of that, and he's worth twice as much as Carroll in my view. It's just too bad that Arsenal would never spend that. Or maybe it's for the best because it would have caused Juan to immediately buy that jersey and have a heart attack from excitement after putting it on.

Rio Ferdinand is definitely growing on me. Don't get me wrong, I still desperately need to see United lose a game, and if he were the one to score a shocking own goal to make it so, I would laugh loud and uncontrollably. But I enjoy him telling it like it is. Opining that Lord Samir of Nasri has been the player of the season thus far (get well soon, Samir of). Calling out Andy Gray and Richard Keys as "dinosaurs." Well done, England captain.

A quick jaunt around Europe: Barca greatest team ever, etc. Even Jose may want out because he's run up against a juggernaut - we'll see him at United in two seasons max. Maybe even next year, if, gulp, United continue on like this. Don't look now, but Roma are fifth in the Serie A with two games in hand on Milan. After starting the season looking like relegation fodder, they're once again proving that their masters of the creep. Slowly, quietly creeping up the table. Sunday's clash with Inter should be good viewing.

Speaking of Sunday, what are the odds on Torres scoring? Let's take a little video recap, shall we?


First Liverpool goal.


Or this.


Yep.


Remember these?

And I know there are a couple more out there. In fact, I'm a little surprised that Chelsea didn't spend all that money just to break his legs out of bitterness and spite. But I guess they were just as curious as the rest of us to see what would happen if they put the best two strikers of the past few seasons (apologies to David Villa, he's up there, too) on the same front line. Of course, they waited until after one got malaria and the other effed his hamstring. But hey, you can't have everything.