Valencia back for Ferbruary?

Fergie has said that Valencia could be back by the end of February, early March, he's not been at the wine has he? It's hard to see that happening and it seems to me to be putting pressure on Valencia  that he doesn't need after such a bad injury.
As for saying we have plenty of cover for Valencia, i would have thought the game against Rangers shows that we probably don't have real quality covering that position. How many goals did Rooney score through Valencia assists last season? I can't see who is going to fill the gaping void, how many goals does Park set up in a season. Giggs does a decent job on the left but can't play every game. The jury is still out mon Obertan, he has the skill, but will he be able to cope with the physical side of top class football. If he learns to, that would go some way to ameliorating the loss of Valencia. And after watching Bebe last night i am surprised Fergie even mentioned him. Surely now, Fergie must regret letting Cleverley going out on loan for the season, he would have got his fair quota of games at United the way we seem to pick up injuries nowadays.
He's looking forward to the game on Sunday as much as ever, he still thinks that this is " the fixture ", well i'm withhim there. But the way Liverpool's finance's are and the way City's are it may not be the same for the upcoming generation.

The Glazer outfit show once more that they fully understand the unacceptable face of capitalism and that that they are proud to practice it. I don't know if it's damaging to our long term of getting rid of them, i suppose it will possibly come out next month.
Where now for the green and gold campaign asks the Telegraph's Mark Ogden. It always amazes that journo's still seem to be under the impression that the green and gols was a MUST idea, and was part of some plan. Unfortunately we all know it wasn't and the reality is MUST's campaign efforts have usually been pretty lame. I haven't got a clue where next, but even the green and gold idea seems to be dying on it's arse at the moment. 

Bebe made his reserve team debut for United yesterday as they were unceremoniously walloped 4-1 by Villa  at Moss lane last night. I think 4-1 flattered Villa a little but they were more than worthy winners. United couldn't seem to live with Villa's pressing game and though a couple of goals given away were pretty soft Villa had the best man on the park on night in Bannan.
As for Bebe he wasn't as bad as some reports this morning have made out but i can't pretend he seemed anything out of the ordinary to me, worked on or not. He can deliver a good cross and is pretty fast, but didn't seem to me to really know when to use it. Another thing i noticed was he didn't seem to be able to run at pace with the ball at his feet which was pretty worrying

Mike Selvey salutes a chivalrous England cricketing hero, whilst Michael Vaughan reveals he has come to realise he wouldn't be where he is today without Freddie. It's interesting reading Vaughan talk about Flintoff as a character, it sounds like he was a bit more high maintenance than i would have thought. Selvey is obviously right that he was a better bowler than batsman.
David Lloyd writes that whatever anyone thinks of him, he was a double ashes winner and played a big part in both of those series wins and not too many others have done that.

Simon Jenkins thinks Nick Clegg didn't read his history books well enough as he tells us centre parties always get squeezed in coalitions, especially if they liberal parties in coalition with tories. As he says when this all blows up there will only be one place left for him to go eventually, the left of the tory party. But as Europhile left wing tory he will be very lonely, i'm sure that is the only reason that he ever joined the lib dems, their position on Europe.
Ben Chu isn't imprssed by Jenkins article, calling it lazy two party thinking.


There have been a fair few number of articles concerning affairs in China and the way they may affect the western world over the last few days. Jeremy Warner has been in China and looks at the way it is leading the way economically, but for all Chinese self confidence he doesn't think they will ever truly lead the world economically. He argues the global economy is just that, global and no one country will ever dominate again, i suppose he means dominate as the Anglo Saxon powers, in the main have for the last 200 years.
The Ft warn us that China's star economist is taking an increasingly bearish outlook at the Chinese banking system, and why we should all worry. That would be the "golbal economy" down the plughole.
After pouring billions of yen into Africa in a bid to secure access to that continent's vast natural resources it is starting to pump them into even bigger projects in South America, America's back yard. The latest example is a huge new superport being built in Sao Joao de Barra that will probably be the biggest in the world when it is built. I has been designed to accomadate the Chinamex, the largest cargo ship in the world. It won't fit down the Ship canal then.
Hong Kong based historian Frank Dikötter has been studying Mao's great leap forward after being granted unprecedented access to Chinese historical papers. And he has confirmed what most already knew, but it seems in far, far greater detail that Mao should be bracketed along with Hitler and Stalin as a mass murdering tyrant.

South Korean economist warns us that we must get capitalism right. He argues that there must be risk in capitalism but that its abuse must be minimised and i presume let the abusers go to the wall, next time.
Meanwhile Independent columist Hamish McRae warns us that America isn't working and that should worry the world. The de-skilling ( if that is a word ) of the western world has been going on since that wacky pair Reagan and Thatcher came to power with what George W.'s father so aptly called voodoo economics. Maybe the labour party should pick up on that phrase to describe the coalition cuts.
There are some good comments below that piece.

Michael Tomasky argues that Karl Rove created a monster and just like Frankenstein he has lost control of it as the US tea party threaten to do untold damage to either the US or the US republican party, let's hope it's the latter. He would hate to go his grave knowing he was responsible for fucking up the American's position as the sole super power in the world and the seeming hegemony of the republican party.