English Premier League: Stewart Downing warns James Milner while Friedel praises Bob
Aston Villa’s left sided midfielder Stewart Downing has informed his fellow Aston Villa team mate, James Milner that he might not get first team football at Manchester City.
Aston Villa have already rejected a 20 million pound bid from the Manchester club and are looking for city to take their evaluation of the energetic midfielder to 30 million pounds. James Milner had a fine season for Aston Villa last season, as they finished above Liverpool in the league in sixth place. Milner made 47 appearances for Villa in the 2009-2010 season, he also scored 12 times for the Birmingham club during the same season.
Milner was also a part of the English national team squad that was selected for the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa. His first start in the competition came in England’s very first group game versus U.S.A. James was shown a yellow card early on in the first half by the referee during the match and therefore he was withdrawn by Fabio Capello around the 38th minute mark.
His next start for England in the World Cup came against Slovenia, where Milner assisted England’s second goal of the tournament as he crossed the ball in behind the Slovenian defense for Jermaine Defoe who made most of the opportunity. Milner also played against Germany in the round of sixteen tie which England lost to their great European rivals, in doing so they also confirmed their elimination from the FIFA World Cup.
Milner’s team mate Downing has recently come out and said that, it will be hard for James Milner to get first team football regularly at Manchester City because of the amount of top level players at the East lands.
Milner remarked that, it would be interesting to see what the starting eleven Roberto Mancini starts off with because of the quality inside Manchester City’s squad. Roberto Mancini, who previously managed Inter Milan, was appointed Manchester City’s manager mid-way during the previous season. He has bought several brilliant players already, such as David Silva from Valencia and Yaya Toure from Barcelona.
Milner also said that there is going to be a lot of in-squad competition at Manchester City for starting places in every game. He added that, it will be Milner’s decision in the end whether he changes clubs or not. Downing also stated that Milner should ask himself the question that whether he wants to go to City and be a part time player or stay at Villa and play first team football regularly. It will be exciting to see what happens next as Milner seems to have his mind set on moving across country to Manchester as soon as a bigger bid arrives for his services.
Downing concluded in the end that his team mate has probably already made his decision with regard to his future. Another one of Downing’s team mates Brad Friedel has come out and praised U.S.A’s coach Bob Bradley for the way the American led his national team to World Cup’s round of sixteen stage. Friedel said that it will be a great move if Bob Bradley could come to England to manage one of the sides in the English Premier League.
Friedel also commented that Bob’s tactics with the U.S.A squad were excellent during the World Cup as well as in the pre-tournament qualification rounds. He further added that he was surprised at how easily England were eliminated by the Germans from the 2010 FIFA World Cup. He also said that England was one of his pre-tournament picks to do well in the FIFA World Cup.
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