Birmingham missed out on Cacau

Soccer Betting Lines

05/13/2010 - Birmingham, England (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Birmingham City manager Alex McLeish has confirmed his club missed out on the signing of Stuttgart's Brazilian-born German striker Cacau.

The 29-year-old seemed certain to leave the Bundesliga club this summer, before changing his mind and penning a new contract with his current club.

McLeish confirmed: "We did miss out on Cacau. We thought we had it in the bag and he did an about turn.

"The irony was when we declared our interest in him, he was out of the team.

"I don't know whether our interest in him gave him a lot more confidence, because he then went on a scoring burst and Stuttgart said there was no way they could let him go with what it would cost to replace somebody like that.

"He is one that got away. It would have been a coup for us, the type of player for the jigsaw I am trying to put together, but we will keep working to strengthen the squad."

(Courtesy of sportbox.tv)

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Big 12 Conference betting odds

Work left to do: Texas Tech, Oklahoma State, Kansas State

Texas joins Texas A&M and Kansas as locks after getting league win No. 11. Texas Tech greatly helped its own hopes and crippled OK State's with the two-point win Saturday. Is K-State the last reasonable hopeful? Could be an elimination match in Stillwater on Tuesday, at least for the Cowboys.

Work left to do:

Texas Tech [18-11 (7-7), RPI: 44, SOS: 12] A critical two-point win over OK State leaves the Red Raiders with Baylor and at Iowa State left. Get both and the Red Raiders likely are good to go. Get one and there could be some interesting comparisons with a K-State team that could finish two or three games "ahead" of them in the standings but doesn't have any of the quality wins Texas Tech has. Not a lot in nonconference play (against Arkansas in Little Rock being the best win, by far) to lean on.

Oklahoma State [18-9 (5-8), RPI: 50, SOS: 35] Still without a road win, the Cowboys now need to win two on the road just to get to .500 in conference play. It's hard to recall a team (OK, other than Clemson) falling so precipitously from lock status to almost certainly out of the NCAAs at this point. There are wins to be had in the last three, including a very big home game against K-State on Tuesday, but this team is reeling. Can you tell the pressure to win is getting to them with the way the final possession played out at Texas Tech? There are some good nonconference performances to lean on, specifically beating Missouri State and Syracuse on neutral floors and Pitt in OK City, but if the Pokes don't right this very, very soon, that won't be enough.

Kansas State [20-9 (9-5), RPI: 56, SOS: 96] It pays to be in the Big 12 North. The nine league wins are Colorado (twice), Missouri (twice), Iowa State (twice), Baylor, Nebraska and (a good one against) Texas. That helps explain the middling computer profile. The win over USC is nice, but the nonconference leaves a lot to be desired. The game at OK State in Stillwater on Tuesday is huge, as it could KO the Cowboys and leave K-State with a home date against Oklahoma with which to work.