During the 2010 World Cup, EPL Talk registered its best month ever in terms of web traffic. On behalf of EPL Talk, I’d like to thank you, the readers, for your continued patronage, as well as the continued excellence shown by all of the EPL Talk bloggers (and podcasters) who have worked diligently to produce thought-provoking articles.

To recognize the considerable achievements, EPL Talk distributed a press release to the media this morning. Here it is in its entirety:

EPLTalk.com Reports Record World Cup™ Web Traffic

LAKE WORTH, FL — JULY 14, 2010 — EPLTalk.com, a leading English Premier League blog based in the United States, registered more than 1 million page views during the 2010 FIFA World Cup™ between June 11 and July 11.

During the 31-day tournament, EPLTalk.com generated 500,205 unique visitors—the highest number in the site’s history. When combined with traffic from EPL Talk sister sites WorldCupBuzz.com and MajorLeagueSoccerTalk.com, web traffic between June 11-July 11 recorded 1.65 million page views and 966,318 unique visitors.

In addition to the record breaking web traffic, the daily World Cup Buzz podcast — featuring soccer experts Richard Farley, Kartik Krishnaiyer and Laurence McKenna — generated more than 258,000 downloads during the 2010 World Cup.

“These results show that informed soccer fans respond to EPL Talk’s quality content and breaking news stories that they’re unable to find anywhere else,” said Christopher Harris, Founder and Publisher of EPL Talk. “Our team of bloggers cover the aspects of ‘the beautiful game’ that matter most to soccer supporters, whether it’s the exclusive interviews with some of the biggest names in soccer, or the critically-acclaimed analysis.”

EPLTalk.com, which is one of nine soccer websites in the EPL Talk Network, features daily news and analysis of the English Premier League as well as a focus on world soccer. Founded in 2005, the website features exclusive audio and video interviews, an archive of more than 5,000 articles, free soccer eBooks, and US TV schedules for soccer.

About EPL Talk

EPL Talk is a leading English Premier League blog with daily news and analysis of the world’s most popular sports league. The web site is part of the EPL Talk Network, which also covers soccer from Spain, Germany, Italy and the rest of Europe. EPL Talk is a privately held company headquartered in Lake Worth, Florida. Reach EPL Talk at (561) 247-GOAL or on the web at www.epltalk.com.

EPL Talk has partnered with BigSoccer, one of the biggest soccer sites in the United States and one of the most well known in the world. BigSoccer will be distributing three soccer podcasts from the Talk family of sites on its’ BigSoccer.com website.

BigSoccer is the leading independent online destination for soccer fans in the United States. Described by Richard Deitsch of Sports Illustrated as “arguably the nerve center of American soccer”, BigSoccer is read by prominent members of American soccer, including players, officials and coaches, as well as members of the media.

The three podcasts which will be distributed on BigSoccer are:

• EPL Talk Podcast: The daily football talk show features interviews and analysis of the world’s most popular sports league, the Premier League. Launched in 2006, the free podcast features interviews with the biggest names in the sport including Martin Tyler, Simon Kuper, Steve McClaren, Tim Vickery, Andy Cole and more than 200 other guests. The EPL Talk Podcast will continue to be distributed via iTunes and this site.
• World Cup Buzz Podcast: World Cup Buzz, the only daily World Cup podcast, debuted in mid-May and has already become a runaway hit after featuring interviews with some of the best world soccer pundits such as Andy Brassell, Raphael Honigstein, Simon Hill, Jonathan Wilson, Andy Gray, Sean Wheelock, Grant Wahl and others. Listen to the World Cup Buzz Podcast on BigSoccer.com, the World Cup Buzz website or via iTunes.
• MLS Talk Podcast: The MLS Talk Podcast is a twice weekly show that switches between interviews with MLS stars and analysis of the league. Previous guests have included Dwayne De Rosario, Jimmy Conrad, Sacha Kljestan, Alexi Lalas, Thomas Dooley and many others. Available at MajorLeagueSoccerTalk.com, via iTunes and now on BigSoccer.com.

On this episode of the World Cup Buzz Podcast, Richard Farley discusses with Tim Vickery the South American teams who will be competing in the 2010 World Cup. Also discussed is the Albiceleste viability of Esteban Cambiasso as well as dissecting the five South American teams who qualified for South Africa from CONMEBOL. Can Brazil win another World Cup? Can Argentina keep it together? That and more on this episode.

Also, don’t forget to catch the two first episodes of the World Cup Buzz Podcast released earlier this week featuring interviews with Andy Brassell and Raphael Honigstein. Coming up tomorrow will be an interview with Martin Tyler followed by Friday’s interview with Simon Kuper.

The Premier League season has ended, FA Cup Final is over, Europa League has a champion, the other big leagues of Europe have also finished. With just the Champions League final left, there is an unpleasant empty feeling that comes from a weekend without Premier League games that I haven’t felt for 9 months (minus international breaks).

Luckily, it is a World Cup year and we have something to look forward to starting up in just a few weeks now. This might make it easier for some of us to cope with the off-season, but for me the excitement of the World Cup is making me much more anxious than if it was a non-World Cup year. With so much more to speculate about than just transfers, I can’t get the game out of my head. So here’s some things I’ve been doing to get me through to the World Cup, and hopefully it will help you all as well.

1. Read soccer books. I just finished Soccernomics by Simon Kuper and Stefan Szymanski. I thought it was great to read just before the World Cup, it gives a great perspective to many aspects of the game. Also, check out The Gaffer’s Ultimate Guide to the Best Soccer Books for more.

2. Play soccer video games. A great way to spend some time normally used to watching games, also perfect for playing with friends or family. FIFA 10 and PES10 are the two current games to be released for multiple systems that have many of the leagues around the world, but last month EA released its Official 2010 World Cup South Africa game which is specifically for this summer’s tournament. Featuring a complete simulation of the World Cup, but also 199 national teams which you can take through qualifying and to the World Cup Finals.

3. Watch matches on your DVR/Tivo or old season review DVDs. If you’re like me, you have probably saved the best matches of the season on your DVR/Tivo, or maybe even all of your favorite team’s games. Watch them again, watch season reviews of the last 3-4 years. Watch with a different eye than you would have before. Now that you know who has qualified, which groups they’re in, and for the most part which players will make their squad, watch with an eye of how this person will impact their team in the World Cup.

4. Get out and play soccer. My favorite on the list. Get out and play with your friends. Have some fun, wear your kit, have a cookout afterwards, and get some of that great fresh air and exercise!

5. Get your home theater set up for the World Cup. You now have less than 25 days to get your viewing place for a month to your liking. Get the new HD-TV you’ve been saving up for ready, and make sure you have it set up correctly. You don’t want to wait for June 10 and be waiting for the cable or satellite guy to show up!

6. Listen to podcasts, read articles, and stay up to date with World Cup news. EPL Talk and World Cup Buzz have big plans for the summer, stay up to date with all of the news and analysis heading into and through the World Cup.  Daily podcasts and articles will provide you with interviews and analysis of the tournament. Also, follow EPL Talk and World Cup Buzz on Twitter and Facebook to keep up to date with all the news, as well as the sister sites for that leagues respective national team coverage. Which other podcasts and blogs from around the Internet do you like?

7. Give your family and friends some time. Use this time to do something that you’ve wanted to do, but didn’t want to leave for a weekend because you didn’t want to miss a game. As reader John Griffin posted to our facebook page, he said he was going to take a beach trip. Perfect opportunity to take a break and return to the World Cup with a fresh mind. However, not to stray too far, John also mentioned watching some other forms of the game such as the “Football League playoffs, Magners League playoffs, Guinness Premiership playoffs, Super 14 playoffs” and of course the Champions League final. Thanks, John. Also, thanks to reader and commenter, Jason has mentioned paying more attention to the MLS. With the other leagues throughout the world coming to a close, the MLS runs through the summer, and has a chance to come center stage for the soccer viewing community until the  big tournament starts.

With less than 25 days remaining til Mexico and South Africa kick-off World Cup 2010, we can get through this just as we do every year, we just need to stick together. What will you all be doing to get your soccer fix until June 11?

Kicking off the World Cup Buzz podcast’s two months of coverage, the Talk network welcomes back Andy Brassell, one of the media’s leading experts on professional football in Western Europe. Andy joined me late last week to talk about the nations from his coverage area who will be competing in South Africa as well as offer a pick for this summer’s finals.

We will be back with another expert on tomorrow’s podcast, but until then, please enjoy Andy Brassell’s views on some of the European nations we’ll start seeing coming June 11.

Author’s Note: You never hear Andy plug it, but Andy has a rather good book in print All or Nothing: A Season in the Life of the Champions League which he didn’t mention during our interview, but given how gracious Andy is to not only this show much to so many others, I wanted to relay my recommendation.

EPL Talk is proud to announce that tomorrow we’ll be launching our newest podcast, World Cup Buzz, which will bring you daily coverage of the 2010 World Cup.

To tell you more about the new podcast, World Cup Buzz Podcast host Richard Farley discusses the upcoming guests, schedule and more in the above video.

On the final day of 2008, I want to send out a huge thank you to you, the readers, for supporting EPL Talk in what has been our best and most successful year ever. Your support and your comments are much appreciated (EPL Talk has now amassed more than 13,000 comments). There’s no way to thank every reader personally but I do want to mention a special thank you to Lonnie (LS), Atlanta Pompey, Lou (eplnfl), Bishopville Red, Double Pivot and DaveMo for contributing the most number of comments in ’08.

As far as articles, EPL Talk now has more than 2,500 of them. Massive thanks go to the team of writers at EPL Talk in 2008 which include Michael James (200 articles), Lonnie (68), Paul Bestall (58), Johnathan Starling (49), Tyler Duffy (49), Sam Dalton (34), Jeff Hash (22), Kartik Krishnaiyer (22), Chris Rivers (14), Josh Pedley (12), Andrew Moshoian, Andrew Morris, Christopher Nee, Dominic Mather, Ferd, Ian Cahir, Jake Hall, James Harris, Jonny Carter, Karthik Balasubramanian, Michael Barany, Phil McThomas, Richard Whittall and Tony Allen. I couldn’t have done it without all of your help.

The year 2008 started well for me after I traveled to Baltimore for the annual NSCAA Convention where I interviewed Steve McClaren and Gerard Houllier for the EPL Talk Podcast. But it all went downhill from there after returning home and being rushed to the hospital, where I stayed for six weeks and had two surgeries to remove blood clots from both of my legs.

Special thanks must go to Chris Oakley, author of the excellent Some People Are On The Pitch blog, who graciously compiled a Best Of episode for the EPL Talk Podcast while I was still in hospital — and to Kartik Krishnaiyer who produced the episode featuring an interview with Paul Gardner (from my NSCAA trip) and Martin Rogers from Yahoo.

After being in the hospital on bed rest for six weeks, I returned home unable to walk and still in immense pain. But thanks to the support of my wife (and goodwill phone calls from Japan courtesy of the Tokyo Toffeeman), I was able to return to full health within a couple of weeks and I’m now 100% healthy again.

The strangest thing for me was that when I finally returned to full health during the beginning of April, it felt like I had missed out on a quarter of 2008. In many ways, I had. During the three different hospitals I stayed at while I was infirmed for six weeks, one of them had Fox Soccer Channel so I was able to watch one live match. The rest of the time I was able to find the scores online.

May, in terms of the Premier League, was a massive month so I was fortunate to witness the wonderful end to the season as well as the Champions League victory for Manchester United. For personal reasons, I was also ecstatic that my team – Swansea City – had gotten promoted from Division One to the Championship.

The year got better in June when I was fortunate to travel to Switzerland for a weekend to watch one match, Italy against Holland, which was one of the best games of the tournament. As I did in the 1994 World Cup in Orlando, I fell in love with the Dutch fans again. This time, in 2008, they took over the beautiful Swiss capital of Bern and I have the pictures to prove it!

The year continued to get better in July, August and September when, after publishing my free travel guide on how to save more than a thousand dollars to attend Premier League matches in England, I was interviewed by BBC Five Live, featured on the two hours of BBC’s World Football Phone-In Show and then interviewed and featured in The New York Times.

From September through December, the year has been a blur for me. In September, my wife and I had a baby boy named Christopher who has been a wonderful addition to the family alongside my three daughters. As you can imagine, raising all of those kids has been a handful and again, I must thank my dearly devoted wife.

In the past several weeks, some of you may have noticed that EPL Talk hasn’t been posting as many remarkable stories as we have done in the past. Other than a lot of sleepless nights due to the baby having colic, that’s because I’ve been busy at work planning for 2009 to make the new year even bigger and better for readers of EPL Talk.

One of the things that suffered from my ill health and arrival of the new baby in 2008 was the inconsistency of the EPL Talk Podcast. But beginning in January, the podcast will return to a twice monthly format and will feature interviews with some of the biggest names in football courtesy of new host Johnathan Starling.

During 2009, Johnathan will also be bringing you daily coverage to EPL Talk with the return of The Daily Digest (a roundup each weekday morning of the major Premier League-related stories from the tabloids as well as his objective criticism and observations), a weekly preview and predictions (every Thursday) of the weekend Premier League matches, and a daily update on Saturday and Sunday of the key decisions in the weekend matches.

Working alongside Johnathan, in addition to the team of EPL Talk volunteers, will be Tyler Duffy (formerly known as Bill E Shears from The Guardian fame), Paul Bestall, James Harris and Josh Pedley. They’ll be bringing you unique and remarkable Premier League-related stories in 2009.

In the next few weeks, EPL Talk will also be undergoing a massive redesign (yet another) to improve the usability of the site, and a move to a dedicated server which will radically improve the loading time of the pages. Plus more surprises and big plans are in store for 2009, so be sure to subscribe to our RSS feed and keep on returning each day.

And last, but not least, a special thank you to all of the contributers responsible for the EPL Talk sister sites including Kartik Krishnaiyer (Major League Soccer Talk), Kevin Walker (Serie A Talk), Juan Arango (La Liga Talk), Mark Moll and Chris Murphy (Bundesliga Talk), Shakira Graham (Championship Talk), George Metellus (World Cup Buzz), Lonnie (Champions League Talk) as well as contributing writers Mike (from Starting 11) and Mitch Howard. If you’d like to write for EPL Talk and/or any of the sister sites, please contact me thegaffer[at]epltalk[dot]com.

As you can tell, 2008 has been one hell of a year for me. Thanks once again for your support, and I’d like to wish you and your family a safe and Happy New Year.

Best wishes,
The Gaffer

If your head is spinning like mine is from all of the Premier League news from the past 48 hours, maybe it’s time to get back to reality and read some interesting posts about other football leagues other than the Premiership. Here are just a few of the excellent articles penned by the other bloggers that are part of the EPL Talk Network:

• Does Capello Know What He’s Doing? (World Cup Buzz) by Dominic Mather,
• Tactical Analysis: Borussia Dortmund (Bundesliga Talk) by Double Pivot,
• Thoughts On The First Month Of The CCC Season (Championship Talk) by Shakira Graham,
• First Round Draw For UEFA Cup (Champions League Talk) by Lonnie Smetana,
• Week 1 Scores From La Liga (La Liga Talk) by Juan Arango,
• The Special One’s Goal Of The Week (Serie A Talk) by Kevin Walker,
• Huckerby, The Hero (Major League Soccer Talk) by Kartik Krishnaiyer,
• Interview With Eric Reed (Major League Soccer Talk Podcast) by Kartik Krishnaiyer.

If you’re not reading the other sites in our network, you’re missing some great articles.

Soccer On Dish writes about how the curse of ITVN has returned to Setanta Sports. La Liga Talk interviews Guillem Balague. Jeff Hash at Major League Soccer Talk writes about the latest results in the U.S. Open Cup (the tournament that’s older than the FA Cup), while Kartik Krishnaiyer on the same site talks about CONCACAF World Cup qualifying as well as the latest MLS news.

Shakira Graham over at Championship Talk provides the comprehensive list of preseason friendlies for Championship clubs. Condolences to Shakira for the loss of her mother.

At World Cup Buzz, Kartik discusses how the second round of CONCACAF World Cup qualifying has wrapped up, while Justin Franklin questions whether Euro success leads to World Cup success.

Thanks to all of the bloggers on the entire network for writing about the game we love.

If your obsession about football isn’t limited to just the Premier League and Euro 2008, be sure to visit the other sites in our network.

At Champions League Talk, Lonnie Smetana has been writing about the top stories among continental European teams such as Porto being allowed to participate in the Champions League and Perrin leaving Lyon.

Juan Arango at La Liga Talk has been writing about ESPN and the rumors of them contemplating the makeover of ESPN Classic into a full-fledged 24/7 soccer network as well as Mario Kempes leaving ESPN Deportes.

Mark Moll at Bundesliga Talk recently wrote an interesting article about the most booked players in the Bundesliga last season. Some of his findings may surprise you.

Kartik Krishnaiyer at Major League Soccer Talk released the latest episode of the podcast featuring an interview with Martin Rennie, one of the youngest persons in the United States ever to obtain a UEFA A coaches license. Plus Kartik writes about the CONCACAF qualifying rounds.

Kevin Walker at Serie A Talk writes about Jose Mourinho’s appointment at Inter Milan.

At Championship Talk, Shakira Graham has the fixtures for the first two weeks of the Coca-Cola Championship League as well as the opening round fixtures for the Carling Cup.

Qualifying matches for the 2010 World Cup have already begun, and Stephane Pedinton has written an article about the key developments thus far from around the world at World Cup Buzz.

And last but not least, Soccer On Dish writes about Fox Soccer Channel moving up the dial on DirecTV as well as changes to DISH Network which means less soccer on that satellite dish.