Aston Villa Made it This Far in Fa Cup

Aston Villa made it though to the fourth round of the FA Cup after getting past Gillingham 2-1. They were paced with a pair of goals by James Milner.

This marks only the second time in the last eight years Aston Villa has made it this far in FA Cup action.

Milner tallied the winner with less than 15 minutes to go in the game with a penalty kick after Adam Miller was called for a foul on Ashley Young in the box.

Manager Martin O’Neill made it clear his side was serious about the FA Cup as he made only three changes from his Champions League lineup that beat Hull. Although Luke Young, Gareth Barry and Gabriel Agbonlahor sat out, the Villa side was still very strong and Gills did well holding up in the match.

The Gills put a scare in their Premier League opponents by evening the score 12 minutes into the second half. It was a well fought battle for Gillingham.

West Ham travel across London to the cauldron of Stamford Bridge today and have little chance of defying their 12/1 odds to beat Chelsea. Since West Ham’s re-promotion to the top flight in 2005/06, Chelsea have won all six league meetings between the sides and are 1/4 with BetUK to win again today.

With just four goals in six away games under former Chelsea player turned West Ham manager Gianfranco Zola, coupled with Chelsea’s defensive record against non-big four sides, and the chances of a home shut out look likely.

Aston Martin May be Sold This Week

Ford is experiencing the worst problem that it has faced in its entire existence. As a part of their restructuring plan, aside from cutting down the number of vehicles delivered to rental fleet, they have announced that one of their luxury brands has been put up in the market and is currently for sale. There have been many rumors as to who would buy the luxury brand. The brand in question is, of course, that one which created the car made famous by James Bond – the Aston Martin.

Reuters recently reported that the Ford Motor Company may reveal the sale of Aston Martin within this week. The leading provider of news all over the world reported that the brand may be sold for more than $865 million. A reliable source revealed that the sale may be concluded as early as this week although it is not yet being confirmed by Ford. In fact, not a word has come out of Ford regarding the issue after Reuters reported the projected date of the sale.

According to Reuters, Formula One team Prodrive seems to be the most possible owner of the marque. Reports added that the Formula One team is working with Egypt’s Naeem investment bank for financial aid perhaps. Although there are other bidders that may come out as the new owner of the luxury performance car brand, Prodrive is being viewed as the new machine that will shape the future of Aston Martin. Other interested bidders include the UK buyout firm Doughty Hanson. It seems that Ford is having talks with a host of interested parties for the sale of Aston Martin. If new developments arise, the projected time of the conclusion of the deal may still be delayed.

Another party interested in the acquisition of Aston Martin is the Syrian-born property tycoon Simon Halabi.

It can be remembered that Ford announced last year that they are looking to sell the ailing luxury brand in order to generate the much needed funds for other businesses that the company is in. The decision was reached after the further slide in terms of sales being experienced by the U.S. car maker. Although they have announced that they are willing to sell the brand either partially or entirely, it seems that the talks being conducted lead to the complete sale of the brand. While the sale of the luxury brand is not enough to completely stop the financial problem of Ford Motor as effective as EBC pads in stopping a car but it will definitely give Ford much needed boost in terms of financial status.

While Ford is selling the brand, Ford announced in January that the brand is in good standing due to renewed interest in the brand. The interest of the public on the brand may have been brought on by the talks surrounding the sale of the brand. And, of course, the appearance of Aston Martin cars on James Bond movies certainly did help.

Ford Could Probably Sell Aston Martin This Week

The Ford Motor Co. is in exclusive talks with Prodrive, a motorsport and automotive company, over the possible sale of the U.S. carmaker’s Aston Martin luxury car unit.

It was earlier reported that Prodrive had trouble financing a bid but the automaker had chosen the company because it had offered a higher price than other interested purchasers. According to reports, more than 450 million pounds would be given to Ford as consideration of the Aston Martin.

To date, the automaker did not release any comment on this matter. However, a source familiar to the potential deal said that the automaker could announce the sale of the Aston Martin as early as this week. Last year, Ford announced that it would sell all or just a part of the Aston Martin to raise funds for other company businesses.

Formula One team Prodrive, working with Egypt’s Naeem investment bank, is the frontrunner to purchase Ford’s luxury unit. Prodrive Ltd. is famed for designing, constructing and racing cars for companies and teams such as Subaru and Aston Martin. The company’s Automotive Technology division, which is based in Warwick, also offers road car design and engineering consultation for other automakers. The company is popularly known for its participation in the World Rally Championship with the Subaru World Rally Team.

However, the source did not deny other enthusiastic bidders such as the UK buyout firm Doughty Hanson. The source added that negotiations are still in the process should talks fall. In addition, the deal also has the possibility to slip away. Sources familiar to the deal said Doughty Hanson and Syrian-born property tycoon Simon Halabi also submitted second-round offers for the Aston Martin in an auction being run by investment bank UBS AG.

According to a top Ford official, the Aston Martin is on solid financial footing. The sales of the car brand were also increased by the James Bond spy movies which made the brand quite popular. According to the sales record, the sales went up by around half last year to about 6,500 units.

On the other side of the automaker’s hype, the Ford Family was awarded the Robert E. Petersen Lifetime Achievement Award this weekend in Indianapolis. The award coincided with the 75th anniversary of the 1932 Ford. Edsel B. Ford II, the great-grandson of Henry Ford – founder of the company, received the award.

“I accept this on behalf of the hundreds of thousands of Ford employees who preceded me, who work with me now and who will come after me,” said Ford. “It really was the entire Ford Motor Company that produced the ‘32 Ford.” The 32 does not only showcase classic Ford body parts but powerful performance as well.

The said award is given annually at the Hot Rod and Restoration Trade Show. Previous awardees include racing legends like Carroll Shelby and Andy Granatelli and automotive designers like George Barris.

“This is the first time the award has honored an entire family instead of an individual,” said Dick Messer, the director of the Petersen Automotive Museum. “There are no more deserving recipients than the two men who literally started the performance industry, Henry and Edsel Ford.”

“I expect there will be hundreds of ‘32’s of all iterations, from stock cars to panel vans to hot rods,” said Keith Crain, the publisher of Automotive News. “It will be a great way to appreciate the history of Ford.”

Audi Enthusiasts Learn About The History Of This Auto Manufacturer

Audi is one of the premier and the most luxurious manufacturers of automobile systems in Germany. They are the producers of the Audi Cars which is a famous car in the world. Besides they believe in innovation too.

History and Origin: The origin of the company can be traced to 1899 and the founder is August Horch. The founder had problems with the company that he was working with. So he was forced to leave the company and he soon started his own brand under his own name. But copyright issues were raised and he was forced to remove the family name in his brand. There he christened the name as Audi for his automobile company. The word Audi actually means in Latin to listen.

They initially started with Audi 2612 cc and they subsequently increased the efficiency more and more. They were mostly used in sporting events. Thus the brand of cars started developing over time and today we are seeing an entirely different world of cars being manufactured by Audi!

Auto Union: An Auto Union was formed when Audi entered in to collaboration with Horch, DKW and Wanderer. This Union was responsible for the production of the Audi Badge that we see today. These were used in Auto Racing Cars with different brand names. As the technology became more and more complex, more and more models were designed. These engines were used by Germany in the Second World War. The other vehicle which was used for the same purpose is the Kraftfahrzeug (KFZ 11) or the Horch Type 80 which was again used by the military.

Audi Logo: The logo consists of four overlapping rings which represents the four marques of Auto Union. Their logo reflects the fact that they are merged with Horch, DKW and Wanderer. The logo is beautifully crafted in such a way that the first ring represents Audi, the second one represents DKW, third one represents Horch, and the fourth and last ring represents Wanderer.

Earlier Times: After the second world war the Auto Union was heavily bombed. The Audi factory then turned into the socialist company “VEB Automobilwerk Zwickau” (AWZ). Post the World War II, many companies like Volkswagen and others rose and started the Auto Union again. By 1960 customers were attracted towards Four Stroke Engines and they became popular. The brands like Audi 72, 75 were invented when Volkswagen renamed their brand as Audi. Until 1972 models from Audi like Audi 60, 70, 80 and Super 90 were developed and they came back again in to the picture very strongly.

In 1969, the Auto Union saw the entry of one more member NSU, which was one of the world’s largest producers of motorcycles. They went on to produce new small cars which are light in wait and safe to drive but still had some problems in their rotary engines.

The Modern Audi: The period after 1970, especially years after the Second World War saw the emergence of Audi as a really competitive brand. It was first introduced in the United States in the post 1970 era. In 1968 saw the entry of the brand Audi 100. It was soon followed by another one in the name of Audi 80/Fox and Audi 50 in 1974. The Audi 50 was very popular in those days as it was invented on the basis of the Golf/Polo concept and it was a huge success all over the world because of its unique design and it is still very much remembered.

The inventions at that time and a proposal from a Chassis Engineer Jorg Bensinger, who promised to develop four wheel technologies. Soon it replaced the Audi brand cars and the racing cars too. The performance car which was developed in 1980 was named as Audi Quattro. Also it was the first German large-scale production vehicle which featured with permanent all-wheel drive through a center differential.

It is commonly referred to as Ur- Quattro in German, where Ur in German means original and unique. Also this prefix is used for other Audi Brands like S4 and S6 brands called as Ur4 and Ur6. These cars were used fro rallying and racing purposes and they soon became very famous. This marked not only the entry of Audi, but also advances in the Automobile World!

In 1985 the companies like NSU and the Auto Union fell and Audi came to be known as Audi AG. In 1986 the Audi 80 brand started developing a very good model which was famously called as the Grandfather’s Image in those days. The great thing about that model is the fact that it sold extremely well in no time. However the engine in the car was not that great even though it had great interior design and good performance. So to counter the shortcomings, Audi came up with a new model Audi 90 which had a superior design and was regarded as a good and an efficient model.

In Early 1990s the sales of the model Audi 80 declined as it said that some basic construction problems was not like by the buyers. This according to a US survey was due to unintended acceleration which happened when the break pedal was pushed. Many say that this problem was mainly attributed to the closeness of the accelerator and the break pedal. However this problem was not raised in any of the European countries as they had the experience of driving in the cars like that and their counterpart’s inexperience to drive in such cars.

However the aftermath was so severe that the US people did not buy Audi cars at all and the sales came down very badly. This led to the renaming of the affected model by Audi as 100/200, but the real name of the company was 5000. Audi had even planned to remove their models but sales went up again in the mid-1990s. The sales began to go on a upswing, thanks to a new model from them A4 in 1996 and the subsequent releases of the models like A4/A6/A8 series, which was developed in collaboration with VW and other sister brands of that time. So dozens of cars were coming from the innovative Audi.

Their Confidence to rule the world in automobile industry grew to such an extent that they started to claim world records, like Top Speed Endurance. The company had always maintained its premier racing game, The Silver Arrows. Even today their sales are in the skies as it is touching new heights day by day.