Didn't notice a thread (hit me with a fish if I'm wrong), but CS Visé in the Belgian Second Division were taken over by a bunch related to our club -
http://www.cs-vise.be/editorial/article.php3?id_article=12 Article isn't explicit, but they're linked to Duchatolet somehow.
There's some interesting stuff in relation to us happening here. The stuff I can tell you;
Terry Fenwick (ex-Arsenal) was hired as manager, he was signed from a club called Central FC in Trinidad and Tobago (ran by Brent Sancho of ex-Gillingham).
They're looking at signing Trinidadian players who I know to be very handy (a couple playing Argentina tonight), mix of young and established
It looks like Visé might be a work-permit dodging route for us to sign some quality players, or at least good youth players. This is me extrapolating from a little bit of info, but it might be a good sign in the long-run. I'm the new Caribbean Head Researcher for Football Manager, so I can tell you that there are a number of players in Trinidad who could help our team. I'm hoping that I'm right, but could be totally wrong
. Football standard in T&T is between Championship and League One, and this is for people training twice a week - the quality is high, if not fitness (although the easier climate over here would help). Players tend to be versitile - it's rare to get a Right-back who doesn't play right-wing, or a striker who doesn't play on the wings. To our advantage (in terms of adapting), strength is often an appreciated strength in the TT Pro League - the top goalscorer over the past 3/4 seasons (Devorn Jorsling) is an Army lieutenant who's clinical and strong. Otherwise, they tend to be explosively quick (Rundell Winchester esp).
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and Visé is just relegated to third division, they were controlled by an indonesion investment group who left a total wasteland. Players weren't paid so they were free to sign elsewhere, they got relegated from the second division last year finishing dead last with 13 points out of 34 games, and lost their licence to play professional football due to having massive debts and not being solvable.
I doubt RD would want to add a third belgian club to his "network" and if he did i doubt he would take over CS Visé.
but i can be wrong
they were "bought" indonesian investors who turned out to be complete frauds and who had no money at all.
i know conspiracy theories are popular on this forum but i really can't belkieve that RD is involved with the recent takeover of Visé. If he was imo belgian media would definately report on that, since RD is kinda "high profile" over here.
Although, that probably wasn't that difficult ;-)
But like i said before i could be wrong on this.
But since he is involved in sports, politics and business here, there are always journalists of all kinds who follow his every move and release whatever because they know mentioning RD attracts readers and attention.
and RD controlling or taking ownership of a third club in belgium would make some juicy stories.
or maybe someone else?
Guerra, should he start, is an okay attacking mid at the Pro League level - he's the only one likely to start. Look for Plaza off the bench - he's scored 18 in 20 games. Yohance Marshal is the best defender in the Pro League (played a season in Burma before that and won a place on the all-star team), but I'm biased as I know him and he's a top, top bloke - the opinion taht he's the best performing defender is others rather than mine.
My prediction - 3-1 to Argentina. Likely that T&T won't score, but I like to be optimistic
i don't know what the british press writes about richard branson, and the other guy, charles dunstone, i don't even know him:)
But then again belgian clubs reached 10 european cup finals in 10 years in that period as well, so begian footbaal was really good at that time and age.
and definately better than the 1990 wc squad that almost knocked out england.
and definately better than the 2002 wc squad when they were knocked out by brazil in what was arguably the hardest game for brazil that world cup, were the 1-0 for belgium was disallowed by a clown referee from jamaica
since 2002 we had a really bad national team, first signs of us gettingb better again was when the current generation reached the semis in the olympic games in beijing.
all i can say is we played the best ever qualification campaign ever - loosing no game out of pot 3 and winning our qualification group unbeaten 9 points clear before croatia.
everyone here expects belgium to cruise to first place in the group stage. after that we meet probably germany or portugal in the round of 16 and if we survive probably Argentina in the quarters.
So unless we play exceptionally well or unless germany/portugal or argentina mess up, i don't expect belgium to go really deep.
But we have team that is capable of beating anyone if we perform on the day, but since the team is very very young i expect them to slip up against the experienced teams like portugal/germany or argentina.
i know in the Uk there is a lot of focus on Hazard and Kompany, but our most important players and arguably our best players in the qualis don't play in the UK : courtois (atletico madrid) on goal, and axel witsel and kevin de bruyne in midfield. Thing is we have a really good player and backup for amlmost every position now. Only the striker position is a bit of a problem, we only have Lukaku and Benteke, and since benteke is injured lukaku will have to play there. But he seems to be in form, so who knows. He will have better supply and have a better midfield behind him than he has at Everton though.
to demonstrate the strength in midfield, AS Roma midfielder Nainggolan didn't even make it to the selection, because we have so many good players there. nainggolan is a player that would make like every national team in the world cup, bar the absolute top teams.
if you want to place a bet on belgium, bet on belgium getting to the last 4 in euro 2016 or the world cup 2018 - then this belgian generation will be more experienced and at a perfect age.