Atletico Madrid’s new coach Quique Sanchez Flores holds a soccer jersey with his name during his presentation at Vicente Calderon stadium in Madrid October 26, 2009. Atletico Madrid have agreed to appoint Flores as coach until the end of the season

Quique Sanchez Flores replaced Abel Resino at the helm on Friday and (even though) he was not officially presented until Monday, he got to work early. The former Valencia and Benfica boss took charge of his first training session as coach of Ateltico Madrid on Sunday morning and spoke to the beleaguered squad at length at the start.
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Want to compete with the Barclay’s Premiership on a global scale? According to Spanish International Fernando Torres, a good place to start is looking at kickoff times locally compared to what time the game would show in the Far East.

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From Reuters:

BARCELONA, Sept 29 (Reuters) - Real Madrid’s strategy of spending huge sums on players is unsustainable as it is unlikely to generate enough income from TV rights, sponsorship and merchandising, according to a new study published on Tuesday.

Real spent 735 million euros ($1.1 billion) on 40 players between 2003 and 2009, according to the study by Jose Maria Gay, a professor of accounting at the University of Barcelona and an expert on soccer finances. (more…)

New signings getting on the score sheet.

With all the movement on the television side of things here in the United States recently, one of the agreements that got somewhat overlooked was ESPN’s deal with GolTV to share the upcoming 2009 / 10 La Liga season.

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Barcelona 4-1 Numancia
Messi 49, 75 Barkero 60
Eto’o 52
Henry 71

Barcelona: Valdes - Dani Alves, Puyol, Pique, Abidal - Toure, Xavi (Hleb 82), Iniesta (Bojan 79) - Messi, Henry (Busquets 73), Eto’o

This could have and should have been a lot worse than what it was, but Barcelona is now 15 points clear at the top.

UPDATE - Our boy Paulie Walnuts brought our attention to this very, very insightful article in the TimesOnline and their take on the present day Political situation and it’s affect around our game.

The Spanish Soccer Federation (RFEF) announced today that they were fining Frederic Kanoute what is believed to be around 3,ooo Euro for pulling up his jersey and uncovering a t - shirt showing his support for Palestine after scoring in Sevilla’s 2 - 1 win over Deportivo La Coruna in the King’s Cup. (more…)