Ah, August. Summer's in full swing. At the beginning of the month the end of school (if that's where you are in life) is long enough behind you to have forgotten about it and the beginning is still far enough off to not have to think about it. And the end of the last football season is now a distant memory and you are ready for a new season to begin.
Of course there is now enough football in the summer to keep any addict happy: Gold Cup, Confederations Cup, International Champions Cup (aka useless exhibition matches for American money), and Champions League pre-qualifiers. But there's no Champions in it yet, so who cares? But hold on. I see the Champions of Malta, Scotland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Bulgaria, Austria and many, many more playing now. I got that wrong. It's in the later rounds in August and in the group stages that are filled with non-Champions playing in the competition for Champions: those from England, Germany, France, Italy, Spain.
But I did not mean to so negative. August is a month of anticipation for a football fan. And for those of a lower division team in England it starts sooner. This Friday the English Championship starts. And so begins another season of "can Aston Villa get promoted"? They've gone for the experienced, short term strategy in their transfer approach: John Terry, 36, Chris Samba and Glenn Whelan, both 33. The "buying our way out of the league" tactic didn't work last year. So now it's, "let's hope we get promoted and will buy better, younger players next summer." Hmm...
It's not just about Aston Villa and the Championship, though. There's all the excitement of new players in the Premier Leagues, how they're going to fit in, who the new unexpected star will be. And the World Cup qualifiers are back: who's going to make a big move, which big country is going to lose touch?
August, oh August. Here we go again, with the good and the bad.
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