Roy Keane : As I See It

One of the most decorated irishman in british football, Roy Keane was a one man army during his prime days at Manchester United. Currently managing premiership side Sunderland, Keane had won a load of titles & cups, competed with the best & had his fair share of controversy.




This brings me to a DVD which quite well could be described as one which epitomizes Keane's Old Trafford Career. The film potrays how Keane, started his footballing career in Ireland. Including exclusive interviews with former coaches and colleagues. Another highlight in this film are the behind the scenes action from Manchester United's Training facility where Keane had to recover after injuries.

As the film progresses, Keane gives his opinions on many topics, some are contreversial ones, one such is his spat with England interenational Alan Shearer & former Republic of Ireland manager, Mick Mcarthy. There are also in depth interviews with Keane's United team mates & his manager, Sir Alex Ferguson.

Interviews aside, the film also potrays Keane, who was one of the big name stars in his time as a private family man, who used to shun the media limelight. towards the end, there clips of some famous & infamous moments in Keane's career on & off the pitch, followed by interviews by Keane, Alex Ferguson & some team-mates.

All in all, after watching the full 75 minutes, i can say that this is one of the better Biography DVD's that i've watched, especially since it includes in depth interviews & behind the scenes footage of Roy Keane's career.

Conclusion:

For Manchester United Fans, this DVD is a must have, since it potrays one Old Trafford's true legend. As for football fans in general, it can be an interesting film, since not many people know much about Keane off the pitch.

Pros: +Lots of exclusive 'no holds barred' interviews with Keane, team-mates, managers & former colleagues.

+Behind the scene footage.

+Controversial Issues discussed.

Cons: -Lack of match clips.

-Not much insight into Keane's skills etc.

My Rating: 8/10

Ryan Giggs Secrets and Skills DVD Review

It was back in 1994, World Cup fever in the US. At the time, I couldn't believe this DVD would exist, especially Ryan Giggs has always been my all-time hero for both Manchester United and football as a whole. I bought this DVD immediately and watch it as I got back.

The DVD plays the whole chapters including Ryan Giggs and Bobby Charlton guiding and teaching basic soccer skills, techniques and set pieces.

Then there's the Production Interview section covering Ryan Giggs's interview on his career and the making of this DVD.

The final section, Additional Footage showcase some significant footage featuring Ryan Giggs playing for Manchester United during his early career and scoring wonderful goals.

The DVD covers basic football skills on a football pitch featuring Ryan Giggs and Bobby Charlton along with voluntary kids.

Early part of the DVD, Ryan Giggs explains the basic ingredients on improving passing techniques showing the right spot to kick on the ball. Passing techniques varies from low and smooth passing and low and hard passing will be explained by Ryan Giggs himself and helped by Bobby Charlton.

Ryan Giggs will also show the most efficient technique on kicking long balls. The long balls will be guided in detail on swinging both the inside and outside of the football boot. One of the most difficult technique in long ball such as chipping are guided by both Ryan Giggs and Bobby Charlton.

One of the fun features in this DVD is that Ryan Giggs showcase his soccer juggling skills using various parts of his body like foot, knee, shoulder and head. Include also difficult techniques like headstall, neck stall and also juggling a soccer ball while sitting on the field. The camera angle on Ryan Giggs's juggling of a soccer ball is quite impressive pointing from the above.

Ryan Giggs also had fun with the kids by playing a one-on-one dribble and showcasing one of his trademarks such as flicking a soccer ball in between defender's leg. I love this part as I tend to replay the DVD in slow-motion over and over and try on a soccer pitch.

Production Interview

An interview with Ryan Giggs explaining about his life and career as a Manchester United player. Also coping on media attentions like photo-shootings and press conferences on and off the pitch. Ryan Giggs also featured in top UK magazines like Match, Shoot, Four Four Two, Manchester United and so on.

Additional Footage

This is a great section and one of the most addictive among other sections showcasing footage of Ryan Giggs's goals during his time as a youth player and professional football player. Some of the best goals including his wonder 'solo' goal against Tottenham are worth watching over and over again. Goals include during his youth days and Premiership.

Advantages

The DVD guided basic soccer skills and certain features like Additional Footage provides good replay value. As I watched this DVD over and over again, although the DVD simply explain basic soccer techniques and skills, it reflects in my opinion Ryan Giggs's characteristics on the football pitch. In short, honing these skills are essential to become a great 'Welsh Wizard' winger.

Downside

Ryan Giggs is a relatively quiet person so we don't get to know his true personality. Most of the skills are explained in detail by Bobby Charlton instead of Ryan himself.

The soccer skills are well-explained but lacks breaking-down into simple steps on achieving an execution of a specific skill for instance, kicking a long ball.

My Conclusion

If you're a fanatic fan of Ryan Giggs and strive to be like the 'Welsh Wizard', then this is the DVD. As I emphasis the advantages on elements to be a successful right or left winger. Also I would highly recommend this DVD to a newbie in football honing basic soccer skills and techniques before stepping into the 'real' football match.

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Review - Learn to Play The Brazilian Way DVD

As the old saying goes "the English pioneered football whereas the Brazilians reinvented the game". In this case, it's true and time and time again we've witnessed the great Brazilians displaying eye-catching soccer tricks and skills along with slick passing movements and clinical finishing. Even I myself would've love to watch at least one of the Brazilian player such as Ronaldinho in a soccer match.

Fortunately, this DVD came right after Brazil won their fifth World Cup in 2002. The DVD is guided by Simon Clifford, one of the most influential person in development of the soccer game especially in the UK.

Pop-in the DVD into your DVD player or PC and you'll see menus featuring Play, Skill Selection and Extras. The DVD is easier to navigate with it's user-friendly interface and particularly on soccer skills selection which in my opinion the most addictive section.

Play

The very first time I watched this DVD is by going through all the sections from soccer skills to soccer juggling tricks and finally the interviews.

Skill Selection

This is undeniably my favourite section featuring all the world-known soccer skills and tricks performed by the greats like Ronaldinho, Ronaldo, Juninho and more. Simon guided a group of youngsters by explaining each skills step-by-step and also shown in real-time ( e.g. Ronaldo's step over on the group stage World Cup match against Costa Rica ) from the World Cup 2002 footage.

Brazilian Soccer Tricks and Skills

One of the great features of this DVD is that Simon shows on doing the soccer skills and applying it against a defender. One of my favourite skills, the Ronaldo step-over ( though some people may refer as the "Rainbow" step-over ) for example, is shown and are broken-down into simple steps.

Applying the soccer trick against a defender is also explained clearly by Simon including the timing of execution of the soccer skill.

Brazilian Juggling Skills and Tricks

Simon Clifford encourage the kids to juggle and hone their soccer juggling skills in a group of circle. Each kids display various soccer flick-ups and juggling techniques. The best part of this is that it encourage the kids to share their soccer skills and enjoyment in soccer.

Passing, Long Ball and Shooting Skills

Simon teaches the kids on various passing, long ball and shooting techniques. He even showed one of the famous long ball technique which Pele called as the "falling leaf" technique used by Ronaldinho in the free kick against England in the World Cup 2002.

The kids also have the chance to shoot one-on-one with the goalkeeper. The drill is simply routine practice to improve your shooting abilities and one-on-one with the goalkeeper.

My Recommendation

The DVD is great for football or soccer players and also for freestyle soccer players as well. The soccer skills, drills and tricks are build around the brazilian environment which include factors such as mentality. A brazilian rythm music is suitable during each drill along with the quality of the sounds are clear.

The only downside for this DVD is the lack of slow-motion feature which I'm dissappointed at especially when learning Ronaldinho's elastico. I had to rewind and play it at slow motion which becomes annoying after a while.

Overall the DVD is great for those who really wants to learn and play like the Brazilian way as it equips with proper mentality and various soccer skills and tricks applied during any situations of a soccer match.

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Review : Really Bend It Like Beckham - David Beckham's Official Soccer Skills

David Beckham was undoubtedly one of my favourite football player in the last decade. He launched his very first soccer skills DVD in the year 2004 and I immediately bought this DVD to give it a try.

Here's my personal review of the David Beckham's soccer skills DVD.

An attractive rectangular-shaped DVD case includes two sets of DVD; Disc 1 and Disc 2. Disc 1 covers the main programme and Disc 2 covers the extras like Behind the Scenes.

Select your favourite or weakest skill and drill through a user-friendly main menu interface.

Disc 1

The main programme shows every football skills and drills like crossing, space making skills, free kicks etc personally guided by David himself.

Basic Skills : ball control and turning skills ( e.g Cruyff Turn)

Off-the-ball skills : a) Defending skills : closing down and defending
b) Attacking skills : space making skills, forward play and working for space

Passing skills : passing and long balls ( e.g chipping)

Finishing and Set-Pieces : finishing and free kicks

All football skills are explained in greater depth and shown in step by step with slow motion. One of the 'cool' features I found in this DVD is the split screen showing both the step by step and the execution in 'real' time.

David also guide the kids with his personal experiences by encouraging them to improve their weaker foot and also the importance of first touch in a 'real' football match.


Disc 2

Special Features

Extra Footage
You'll able to see what's behind the making of this DVD involving David Beckham and other crews. The kids in this DVD have a once in lifetime chance to ask questions regarding David's personal life and professional career. I personally love to watch the kids playing a football game with David. Some of it are funny and some are interesting.

Special Effects
A 'cool' feature for those who likes to know more about the technology used to motion capture, time slice and slow motion effects. I found this one to be interesting because I get to study David's movement and technique in absolute detail.

David's Football Highlights
Watch David Beckham's important moments for Manchester United, England and possibly in footballing history. Some of you may want to replay his goal from the half way line against Wimbledon in 1996.

DVD Rom
Users are able to print out the coaching plan of the skills and drills so that you can always refer and practice.


My Recommendation

Newbies in soccer are recommended to watch this comprehensive DVD as you'll learn the skills and drills related to the actual situation in football matches and also receive useful tips from David himself.

However it lacks entertaining skills like step overs which might go against 'artistic' players. Experience players may like to reinforce certain basic skills that they're weak at. Until now I'm still watching this DVD to improve my weaker left foot.
In general, the DVD is great, user friendly along with good replayability value at an affordable price.

Find out more on:

David Beckham's Official Soccer Skills : Really Bend It Like Beckham

Review: Billy Wingrove : Learn Freestyle Football Vol 1

I'm very keen in freestyle football since last year, 2006. So I watched a few video clips on the internet to learn a few tricks. I thought I'd give it a go on this DVD and see how it can improve my freestyle soccer tricks. Here's the review:

There are several features on this DVD and all are guided by Billy himself.

First Part
Recommends proper equipment like the outfit, shorts, shoes and a soccer ball for freestyle soccer.Teaches some basic warm-ups like stretching knees and calfs before you start practicing freestyle soccer. Then some basic juggling soccer skills and simple stalls on each part from foot to head.

Second Part
You'll learn some intermediate skills like Guardiolas. You'll also learn on combining previous skills that you've learned to form a simple combination. There are 3 combinations showed in this DVD varying in difficulty levels.

Third Part
In this section, you'll learn on how to apply certain tricks in the soccer field. Billy will show you on a futsal turf on how to do soccer tricks like Penalty X, Cyclone and many more.

In between the 3 parts of this DVD will show Billy Wingrove's background, his favourite Premiership team, his career and where he started playing freestyle soccer.

My Recommendation
After watching this DVD for several times, I found that the DVD is useful for newbies in freestyle soccer. If you're unfamiliar to basic soccer skills, then this is the DVD for you because Billy will show step-by-step with slow motion in each soccer trick. But for those who are intermediates and advance freestylers may get disappointed because the lack of cool, hard-to-do tricks.

Overall the DVD has an excellent replay value and it's worth investing to start your freestyle soccer adventure.

Find out more information on Billy Wingrove : Learn Freestyle Football Vol 1

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