There’s nothing really wrong with knowing more about football stars than world leaders. At your age, most of you are naturally more interested in sports and other forms of entertainment than you are in politics.

Starting today, post tips will take advantage of the intense interest among many Thai students in English football, particularly the top professional league known as the Premier League. Each week this term, there will be a fun activity based on that week’s schedule of matches between Premier League teams.

Don’t worry if you don’t like English football, however. You really don’t have to know much about football to enjoy the activities. There will be learning activities based more on the places where the games are played than the games themselves. And, of course, they will be entirely in English!

Let’s get started.

Where will Arsenal’s star forward Thierry Henry be playing tomorrow? — REUTERS

Exploring the Premier league Aston Villa’s Paul Merson scoring the winning goal at Everton’s Goodison Park last week. — AP In which city was Aston Villa’s game against Everton played? Does Aston Villa play its home games in a city called Aston Villa? In which part of England will Aston Villa’s Paul Merson be playing tomorrow? Will he and his teammates have to make a long trip to get there? Where is Manchester? Why doesn’t London have a team – or does it? Is West Ham United from the western part of England? POST Graphics Suchart C.Vanitchakorn Click the small map here to see a larger version. With that unique map you can find the answers all these questions. It is a map of England showing the location of each of the twenty teams in the English Premier League. Be sure to bookmark the larger map because we will use it throughout this term for activities based on the Premier League schedule of matches. Exercise Refer to the map and the schedule of tomorrow’s matches to answer the questions below: Tomorrow’s matches Saturday, 18 November 2000 (Teams playing at home are listed first.) Charlton v Chelsea Coventry v Ipswich Derby v Bradford Everton v Arsenal Leeds v West Ham Man City v Man Utd Middlesbrough v Leicester Newcastle v Sunderland Southampton v Aston Villa Tottenham v Liverpool Focus on London How many London teams are travelling outside the city tomorrow? Which one has the longest journey? Which two London-based teams are playing each other? Which one of these two teams is the home team? Which river is near the stadium where they are playing? Which other London team is playing at home and which team will it be playing against? Outside London English football fans are famous for their loyalty to their favourite teams – especially the team in their own city or neighbourhood. They also are famous for promoting rivalries with other nearby football clubs. Often, the shorter the distance between the two clubs, the stronger is the rivalry. Look at the matches scheduled for tomorrow outside of London. Which two matches are likely to involve the strongest rivalries? rivalry competition, esp. a competition between two teams or groups which creates a lot of excitement or emotion.

TEACHER'S NOTE

Make sure your students notice the map’s scale on the bottom of the map. They will need to use it to determine approximate distances. Also make sure your students save their maps because they will need to use them in the coming weeks.

Teachers should be aware that heavily discounted issues of the Bangkok Post are available to use with their classes. Call the Bangkok Post at 240-3700…ext 1608.

Answers: Who are the people pictured above?

Top row: Tony Blair (Prime Minister of Great Britain, Alan Shearer (Newcastle United)
Second row: Michael Owen (Liverpool), Yoshiro Mori (Japanese Prime Minister)
Third row: Hosni Mubarak (Egyptian President), David Beckham (Manchester United)

Next week: Talking about the election. Next week your students will learn much of the key vocabulary needed to discuss the upcoming Thai election – and any other election they choose to read or talk about.

Below is a word commonly found in the newspaper. Instead of just giving you a definition, however, I am going to let you guess its meaning. I have put the word in the caption below and a series of sentences, so you can see for yourself what it means and how it can be used. thrash Manchester United’s Teddy Sheringham shoots home a goal past Jason Dodd (left) during his team’s thrashing of Southhampton at Old Trafford. — REUTERS English Premiership leaders Manchester United went goal crazy yesterday, thrashing Southhampton 5 - 0 at Old Trafford with English striker Teddy Sheringham scoring three goals of his own. He took out his whip and proceeded to thrash his tired horse until it started bleeding. Unable to swim, he thrashed around blindly in the water, screaming for help. Immediately after his team was thrashed 6 - 0 in Milan, the coach was told he had lost his job. The animal lay on the ground, thrashing its legs in pain. Whenever I did anything wrong, like failing to finish my homework or my household chores, I always got a thrashing from my father. Disappointed after their 52 - 3 thrashing by a strong New Zealand team, the Welsh players vowed to do better the next time around. 1. From the examples above, it is clear that thrash can be used with all of the following meanings except: to hit very hard to criticise someone very strongly using harsh words to move in a series of violent, uncontrolled movements to defeat an opponent very badly in a competition 2. It is clear that thrash is a verb. Does it have a noun form, and if so, what is it? 3. Use the correct form of thrash in each of the sentences below. The last I saw him he was _________ around in the dark through the bushes. Mike Tyson said he was going to give his opponent the worst ________ of his life. Arsenal should be able to _______ Southhampton by a wide margin. Go to, then bookmark our words in the news so you can check out new words six days a week.