Newcastle United

Looking back on this last season of football, it's funny how I didn't notice the Toons' absence in the Premier League. Fortunately, next season will be graced by their presence again after a solid year in the Championship.

Newcastle has never been a particularly important team to me, but they've always been there as long as I've known English football.

The first leg of the quarter finals of the Mexican football league ended yesterday with a 2-2 tie between millionaire team Club America and Toluca. America was the only home team in the first leg that did not win. However, a simple win at the Nemesio Diez next Sunday will see them through to the semis. Toluca has always been a great defensive team and have been known to play entire games with little attacking aims. Despite still not having their prolific goalscorer most of this season, America has been a pretty solid offensive team, in a three-way tie for most goals by a single team this last regular season.

What do I expect for the return leg? I think three of the now visiting teams have a good chance of advancing to the semis: Morelia who have a 4-2 lead over Chivas, Santos who have a 2-0 lead over UNAM, and America. The other team with a lead after the first leg, Pachuca, I think will succumb to the defending champion Monterrey in Monterrey's Tecnologico stadium.

So where will that leave us for the semis? If my current predicted victors advance, the semis would look like this: Monterrey vs Morelia with the return leg played in Monterrey, and Club America vs. Santos with the return leg played in Santos' Nuevo Estadio Corona. I would predict Monterrey and America advancing to the finals with the return leg played again in Monterrey, since they were first place in the regular season. This would be an interesting final, since in recent history, Monterrey have neutralised America's offense and effectively shut down their defense. But America has been playing better football lately, if not exactly what we expect from a team of their history and reputation.

Monterrey has a good chance of defending their title, thus becoming the second team to win back-to-back titles since the newer short tournaments were introduced in 1996 with liguillas, or playoffs, to determine a champion instead of simply to the top team becoming champions like in European leagues. Liguillas or playoffs are mostly a New World concept, with its use in football spreading from the U.S. down to Brazil and Argentina.

America however, also have a decent chance of winning their 11th title in their almost 100 year history. Doing so, they'd be tying Chivas with the most titles in Mexican football history.