No disrespect to amputees but I have never thought those who have been unfortunate enough to lose a limb would make for great footballers. How wrong was I?

This video shows some of the highlights from soccer games held during the African Cup Of Nations for Amputees. That’s right, a tournament just for players with one leg or one arm.

The outfield players have all lost one leg and get around on crutches. And yet they can still pass, shoot, and tackle just as well as players who have the use of all their limbs.

This is amazing, quite frankly. I’d go and see one of these games. As a spectacle it beats watching anything the Premiership can provide.

I don’t have a problem when police are protecting and serving people, but then someone starts unnecessarily clubbing someone it just boils my blood.

There definitely needs to be a balance of power, and that can be seen at this sport event.

There is a difference between a riot and a group of people standing up for themselves. Sure, the man in the video running was acting like an idiot waving a flag, but this type of thing is a frequent occurrence at games.

I, for one, would like to see this type of “crowd-control” realised in every day situations for overstepping power. There are just way too many police brutality videos as it is.

I wouldn’t normally wish anyone any ill, especially humiliation in a public setting that they’ll have to live with for the rest of their lives. But boy, did this soccer player deserve it.

During a match between Al Ahly and Kima Aswan in Egypt, Amir Sayoud attempted to score from the penalty spot. In order to do so he tried the classic fake-out approach which has become standard over the last two decades.

Unfortunately for him, rather than tricking the goalkeeper into diving early or the wrong way, it tricks his feet into tripping him over. He ends up up with his face in the dirt, the ball slowly trickling its way towards goal with no chance of going in.

Let this be a lesson to all soccer players: Don’t try and be clever when taking a penalty, as you’ll end up looking like a tool when it goes wrong.

He’s going to score, he’s going to score, he has to score, it’s an easy shot. Oh wait, what the hell did he do that for? Geez, get a grip Mario Balotelli, you absolute idiot.

This is an astonishing example of a footballer (or soccer player for all you Yanks) trying too hard to impress his boss and the fans. And failing miserably as a result.

Rather than just side-footing the ball into the net, Balotelli tries to back-heel the ball past the goalkeeper and makes a complete hash of it. His manager Roberto Mancini immediately substituted him and gave him some verbal abuse.

Some have speculated Balotelli thought he was offside, hence his decision to give up trying to score. But I don’t buy that. I think he just wanted to showboat during a pre-season friendly.

The Women’s World Cup final was held On Sunday (July 17), with Japan beating the U.S.A. on penalties after a tense, tight match. And Americans actually seemed to care about the result.

I found this all a little bizarre because all of a sudden I had American friends talking about football, or soccer as they insist on calling it, on Facebook and Twitter. They didn’t talk about the Men’s World Cup at all.

This tells me either that Americans are more interested in women’s soccer than they are in men’s, or that they need the U.S. to reach the final before they’ll care about it in the slightest. Sadly I suspect it’s the latter.

The other thing that’s strange is the anti-Japanese sentiments being fired off by idiots. World War II ended 66 years ago, so I think it may be time to forgive and forget. Some people don’t seem to be able to do so.

Soccer players have a reputation for milking penalties with some pretty outrageous fakery. But I’ve never seen anything quite as fake as this spot of expert football faking from a Brazilian woman.

Early on in this clip we see the girl making minimal contact with an opponent, walking around for a bit, before crumpling over with the greatest pain the world has ever known.

She’s carried off on a stretcher, but doesn’t even make it to the change rooms before she’s running back to her teammates. It’s a miracle! Surely she’s been healed by the hand of God!

Or perhaps she didn’t get that penalty she was hoping for in the first place!

I can’t quite believe this sort of thing is still happening in 2011. Are these people really that stupid to believe racism is big, clever, or in any way right?

In the 1960s and 1970s, when the first black footballers were just emerging into the big leagues, racism was rife. People would throw bananas and other stuff on to the pitch, sometimes directly aiming for a player.

But I thought we’d left that era well behind us, with the world becoming a much smaller place and people realizing we’re all the same underneath. But clearly not in some small pockets of society.

I cannot fathom racism. It is just such a retarded outlook to have on life and the way in which we’re all connected to each other. And this is an example of that stupidity.

I’m not that much of a football fan these days, but when I see a skill such as this one I’m left with my mouth agape in wonderment at how someone can be so freakishly talented.

At 31-years-old he may be getting on in age a little (for a soccer player at least), but Ronaldinho certainly hasn’t lost any of the ability which made him one of the best footballers the world has ever seen.

The continual keepy-uppies he starts off doing isn’t much to write home about, granted, but what happens next seems to bend the laws of physics.

Ronaldinho kicks the ball straight up in the air, instinctively knows where it’ll be landing, and stops it dead on the top of his foot. Then to top it off he nutmegs one of his teammates.

If anyone know how he did this, send your answers on a postcard. Because I cannot figure it out.

This video goes some way to demonstrating there are idiots everywhere. Bear in mind that the people throwing the firecrackers support the team the player they’re throwing them at plays for!

This is the Romanian Cup Final from earlier this week. Dinamo Bucharest were playing against Steaua Bucharest when Dinamo midfielder Elis Bakaj broke free down the wing and reined in on goal.

It was at this point that some helpful fan for some reason decided to chuck his firecracker onto the pitch, almost hitting Bakaj in the process. Not to be swayed, the midfielder still delivered a fine cross.

This is such a dangerous thing to do it doesn’t bear thinking what would have happened if he’d taken it in the eye. I really don’t know why they let fans take these kinds of things into games in the first place. Asking for trouble?

Ryan Giggs has been in the news a lot this week. No idea why. But according to his Man Utd manager Alex Ferguson that means his name cannot even pass the lips of journalists at his press conference, even if the question was actually about the team and the upcoming game.

After the question is asked he whispers to the press officer asking who the reporter was. When he finds out who he is and that he’s coming to another press conference on Friday he says, “Then we’ll get him, we’ll ban him on Friday.”

And that for merely mentioning the name of a player in the team. There was no mention of the other thing Giggs has been in the news for this week, so why the banning? It’s pure vengeance.

I already couldn’t stand Alex Ferguson, but this has lowered my opinion of him by several more notches. When he retires I think I’ll throw a party to celebrate.

David Beckham is not only still alive and playing football, he’s still banging in the odd free kick. And this one, for L.A. Galaxy vs. Sporting Kansas City, is a pretty damn good one.

If I’m honest I wasn’t even aware David Beckham was still playing football. I know he went to the U.S. to play for L.A. Galaxy a few years ago for a ludicrous amount of money but I thought he’d retired recently.

Instead, as this video shows, he still possesses some rather awesome skills when it comes to getting a football (or soccer ball as he probably now calls it) to do what he wants it to.

All this does, however, is make me realize what a one-trick pony Beckham was all along. Oh, he could cross and pass quite well too, but he’ll really only be remembered for a few amazing free kicks. And the range of hairstyles he has sported over the years.

Justin Bieber recently trained with the Barcelona football team (well, the reserves at least). Why? I don’t have a clue, but it does annoy me, as so much of what the floppy-haired ladyboy does happens to.

There is so much wrong with this whole thing I don’t know where to begin….

Why was Justin Bieber given the chance to train with Barcelona? There must be many more deserving people out there who’d like to do so. Why is he wearing the gayest color training strip available? That has to have been the players’ idea, surely.

I have to say he isn’t all that bad at football, even though he probably calls it soccer. I guess Canadians have a better handle on the sport than their cousins to the south.

However, Bieber does kick like a girl. But then I guess that shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise seeing as he clearly has a vagina hiding under those shorts.

There’s always one, isn’t there? That lone person in a group who has to ruin everything for everyone else. In this case it’s a solitary supporter of the U.S.A. soccer team who feels the need to ruin the moment’s silence dedicated to the victims of the earthquake and subsequent tsunami in Japan.

As it isn’t at all hard to be quiet for a few seconds, at least for most people, you have to assume this was intentional. This one guy clearly doesn’t like Japan or its people and so decided to act like a dick.

While there are quite a few people murmuring and speaking amongst themselves, which is bad enough, this one guy decides to chant “U.S.A., U.S.A.” before shouting, “Konichiwa bitches.”

Can this American idiot really still be holding a grudge over Pearl Harbor? I’d like to think not but I saw some nasty things said on the Web immediately after the tragedy that suggest it’s still on the minds of some. How sad.

Wayne Rooney won the game for Manchester United in their local derby against bitter rivals Manchester City with this spectacular goal. A goal Rooney himself has described as one of his best ever.

In every sport there are grudge matches, usually between teams with a long, intertwined history, and more often that not from the same region. Soccer has countless number of these, with the Manchester derby being one of the bitterest.

In the English Premier League derbies occur twice a year, once at each ground. On Saturday Man City headed for Old Trafford and came away with nothing thanks to a certain Mr. Rooney.

Was the overhead kick one of his best goals? Most definitely. And it was also very important in the fight for the Premier League, with the 1-0 win over a contender for the crown meaning United has a significant lead at the top.

This is the follow-up video released showing sexism amongst the Sky Sports soccer team. This one shows Richard Keys describing all women as ‘It’ and nothing more than sex objects for Jamie Redknapp’s delectation.

This is somehow worse than the other clip because it’s not even in a soccer context. They’re not talking about a female linesman this time, but women as a whole.

It’s also more surprising, and a little disappointing, to hear Richard Keys talking like this. I always thought Andy Gray would be a idiot off-screen, but I thought Keys was a mature, family man who wouldn’t say this kind of crap.

With both of them having gone a line needs to be drawn in the sand. Sky Sports clearly needs a female presence to wash away the layer of sexism which clearly dominates. So I’m hoping for a female presenter to replace Keys. The audience won’t like it though…

This video features the audio of Richard Keys and Andy Gray making sexist comments as they discuss the inclusion of a female linesman for the game between Liverpool and Wolves.

Andy Gray has been fired for these comments, and the other ones he made where he was discussing whether she was attractive or not. But what about Keys? He seems to have got away with just a slap on the wrist.

To me this whole episode suggests Sky Sports, and the soccer world as a whole, is still dominated by men; men who don’t want to see women involved in their precious sport. How Neanderthal.

Believe it or not there are actually groups calling for Gray to be reinstated, as if he’s the one that has been wronged here. I never liked the guy anyway, so I say, “Good riddance, it couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.”

Dropping the C Bomb seems to be coming something of a regular occurrence at the BBC these days. The latest example being a BBC News sports reporter ending a story with the immortal line, Eric C*** Cantona.

Eric Cantona may be a lot of things, and he may even be a bit of a c***. But there’s surely no need to call him out for being one of these on live television.

BBC News obviously didn’t get that memo, because the sports reporter can clearly be heard saying, “Eric C*** Cantona. There is no pause, no correction, no apology; he just says what he says and lets it stand.

While James Naughtie’s slip-up was clearly an unintentional error, I’m not so sure this was. Maybe the guy is a Liverpool fan ad couldn’t resist the chance to mock Cantona live on air. Whatever the truth, it’s very funny.

When Aston Villa equalized in the last minute to make it 3-3 in their match against Chelsea, Stan Collymore went absolutely nuts, screaming as if he’d scored himself. The only problem being he was commentating on the game for a radio station.

Collymore was meant to be appearing on talkSPORT as a commentator and pundit, and as far as I’m aware it’s usual for people in such positions to remain impartial and professional at all times. In which case, Collymore failed spectacularly.

It’s really no wonder Chelsea fans who witnessed Collymore cheering on the opposition turned on him, and yet he finds it absolutely astounding that they did so.

I don’t understand the passion people have for sports, but on this occasion I can see where the Chelsea fans were coming from. Collymore, meanwhile, should stop pretending he’s a professional broadcaster and stick to being a fan.

Which countries would you pick to host a World Cup? If you’re FIFA then Russia and Qatar are the best options for 2018 and 2022. Naturally.

In the same way it’s seen as a badge of honor hosting the Olympic Games, it’s also seen as a huge honor hosting the World Cup. Which is why several countries make bids every time one comes up for grabs.

Yesterday saw FIFA announce who’ll be hosting both the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, and the winners turned out to be Russia and Qatar respectively. Both were total outsiders and total surprises.

Russia has no infrastructure in place, and Qatar is a country with strict Islamic laws that is not known for its tolerance of outsiders. Perfect choices, I’m sure you’ll agree. Especially when England, Spain/Portugal, the U.S.A., and Japan were all in contention.

Sepp Blatter, you’re an idiot.

What an absolute nightmare it must be to crap yourself during an important World Cup football match. Still, it’s funny to watch as well. Sorry, Gary Lineker.

This video shows Gary Lineker – former England striker and now host of Match Of The Day – crapping himself while in the middle of a match against the Republic of Ireland at the Italia 90 World Cup.

The audio comes courtesy of Radio Five Live as Lineker reveals the truth of what happened for the first time. He clearly did a good job of hiding the incident at the time as no one seemed to realize.

I was laughing throughout this video but actually I feel rather bad for the guy. And I feel bad for the rest of the players on the pitch. And the kit-man who had to boil Lineker’s shorts after the match.