Poll: Champions League Final - Barcelona vs Manchester United - 27th May 2009 *SPOILERS*

Who will you be supporting on Wednesday

  • Barcelona

    Votes: 87 36.4%
  • That other team

    Votes: 152 63.6%

  • Total voters
    239
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Associate
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I'll say one thing: La Liga is far more entertaining than the Prem. I'd rather watch Atletico Madrid play Villarreal or Sevilla than watch Aston Villa play Everton, that's for sure!
 
Don
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Poor example. The Villa - Everton games were fantastic this season.

Regarding La Liga vs EPL. Our top 4 is better as a whole than Spains (Barca are the only club that are on a level with Liverpool, Utd and Chelsea) however in Spain they do have greater strength from 5-15th imo.
 
Soldato
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Poor example. The Villa - Everton games were fantastic this season.

Regarding La Liga vs EPL. Our top 4 is better as a whole than Spains (Barca are the only club that are on a level with Liverpool, Utd and Chelsea) however in Spain they do have greater strength from 5-15th imo.

Yeah, I reckon the likes of Osasuna etc. would thrash the dross at the bottom of the PL e.g. Hull, Sunderland.
 
Don
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lol Atletico couldnt even beat relegation form Bolton over two legs.

Firstly that was last season, secondly Liverpool didn't beat Atletico over 2 games this season and Utd didn't beat Villarreal over 2 games either.

Do you honestly believe that the likes of Villa and Everton are as good as either Valencia or Villarreal?
 
Caporegime
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Firstly that was last season, secondly Liverpool didn't beat Atletico over 2 games this season and Utd didn't beat Villarreal over 2 games either.

Do you honestly believe that the likes of Villa and Everton are as good as either Valencia or Villarreal?

*sighs*

Sky have made the premier league out to be the best league in the world, as have the papers. It's hard to shake that label now.

Spain, have much better league in my opinon, there are lots and lots of fantastic teams. They have a lot of spainish players, and all play football.

England, has very litte home grown players in comparision to other leagues, because players come here for a pay day, many teams in the league survive playing route one, physical ugly football.

There are the top 4 teams in england that are good. Everton, Villa, Spurs, sorry but they're no where near the as good as the chasing pack in spain.
 
Caporegime
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What's the 'sigh' all about? I just said that La Liga has greater strength in depth you numpty :p

I know :p

I was just sighing at people who are still in the "England is the best league"

Sky really have brainwashed a nation :p

Another thing, foreign players are bad for our game, Italy & Spain, World and European champions, and they also have a high percentage of home grown players in their league, compared to england. Who keep heaping praise on over rated english men.
 
Soldato
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Another thing, foreign players are bad for our game, Italy & Spain, World and European champions, and they also have a high percentage of home grown players in their league, compared to england. Who keep heaping praise on over rated english men.


What???

Foreign players are bad for the game?

But English players are overrated?

So we dont want Foreign OR English players in the league?

:confused:
 
Caporegime
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What???

Foreign players are bad for the game?

But English players are overrated?

So we dont want Foreign OR English players in the league?

:confused:

Re read what I wrote.

Foreign players are bad, it stops our home grown English players getting to the top of our game.

The "few" English players we have playing at a top level, are over rated as there is very few of them in comparision to the Spainish / Italian league.

I said we want less foreigners and more English players, helping us develope our national team.
 
Soldato
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Re read what I wrote.

Foreign players are bad, it stops our home grown English players getting to the top of our game.

The "few" English players we have playing at a top level, are over rated as there is very few of them in comparision to the Spainish / Italian league.

I said we want less foreigners and more English players, helping us develope our national team.


I understand entirely what you wrote down, and what you wrote down, doesnt make any sense, and your explanation, doesnt make any sense.

How would having less foreign players make english players that are not good enough to get into sides above them now, better?

Whats hampering English players, is English scouts and youth coaches, who only want strapping 6 footers who can run a bit and everyone else, no matter how good they are, are shown the door.
All that will hapen with your brilliant idea, is Man U, Chelsea and Liverpool will buy all the best strapping 6ft clod hoppers, still dominate the league, and get turned over by every other European side going.

This is an overreaction to the what happened on Wednesday anyway, we didnt moan like this with AC Milan made Liverpool look like chumps in their rematch, Or when Barcelona beat Arsenal, Fergie let sentiment cloud his judgment and he paid for it, had he picked the right side, and not tried to take Barcelona on, the result might of been different.
 
Soldato
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Fergie let sentiment cloud his judgment and he paid for it, had he picked the right side, and not tried to take Barcelona on, the result might of been different.

I dont agree with that - I dont believe Fergie had anyone available (for the midfield) that would have made a difference

Fletcher (banned) and preferably Hargreaves (injured) where really the only players who could have turned that game to a different conclusion (and to a lesser extent Brown for OShea....who had a reasonable match)

I think the formation was correct for who we where playing and having Ronaldo up top on his own was correct - as Utd needed two wide forwards really tracking back, and we all know Ronaldo rarely does that

It was the formation of the middle three that really didnt work out for Utd after the first 10 minutes - and even if Barca had still won, I think it would have been a much closer game
 
Man of Honour
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Whilst Man.U. have a forward line that is arguably the best in the world and a defense that's good enough for any team their midfield is just...alright I guess.
Giggs & Scholes are past it, Nani & Anderson haven't made it yet, Park and Hargreaves probably never will (for different reasons), not sure about Fletcher, Carrick's not bad though.
They've always had power and control in midfield which wins them games when they come up against forward lines or defenses as good as their own, in the CL final they didn't have that quality to help them and were found out.
 
Caporegime
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I understand entirely what you wrote down, and what you wrote down, doesnt make any sense, and your explanation, doesnt make any sense.

How is promoting English youth players a bad thing ? I think that the English game, needs to develope it's talent, not buy in foreign players who are damagin our national side.


How would having less foreign players make english players that are not good enough to get into sides above them now, better?

It wouldn't make them "better" it would at least give them a bigger chance, to play and improve. The coaches of the clubs aren't bad per say, they're just not working with young English players and developing the correct part of their game. English players imo, lack techniqual ability on the ball, compared to a lot of foreign players. They don't pass enough ect ect, they're all about being physical and getting the ball in to the box.
 
Soldato
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I'd say Barca do and by a long long way. Could only imagine a United fan arguing otherwise.

Not really as there is nothing to argue about. A good/great/worldclass team is usually greater than the sum of it's individual parts. I wouldn't swap Rooney with anyone simply because what he does suits our style of play. Take Henry for example, he was on his last legs in his last season for Arsenal. Plays well for Barca and fits their style of play. Put him back in the prem and I doubt he would look any thing more than alright.

Tummy said:
How is promoting English youth players a bad thing ? I think that the English game, needs to develope it's talent, not buy in foreign players who are damagin our national side.

Funny you should say that but I was at a Football Coaches evening a few months back with Andy Cole and he was saying at the top clubs the foreigners aren't a problem it's the local and English talent. Usually the last in to training and the first to leave.

Tummy said:
It wouldn't make them "better" it would at least give them a bigger chance, to play and improve. The coaches of the clubs aren't bad per say, they're just not working with young English players and developing the correct part of their game. English players imo, lack techniqual ability on the ball, compared to a lot of foreign players. They don't pass enough ect ect, they're all about being physical and getting the ball in to the box.

Some of what your saying is true, some isn't

Clubs do work with youngsters from a very early age but they all have their own agendas. At Liverpool we have seen them pretty much rip up their academy set up in recent weeks and start again. I know for a fact at Utd they are reverting to a policy of developing athletes of a certain height and weight. So much so that fathers are being asked to come along to have testing done on them (Bone structure, muscle mass etc)to predict how their kids will develop physically. It was once considered that the academy coach(11 yrs +) was the most important along with the manager. This has now changed and pretty much any club worth its salt is investing more and more into the 5-11 yr olds.

Technical ability will improve with current changes to grassroots coaching. As you say developing athletes has contributed to this. Too often, coaching sessions were always about the coach 1st and the player second. All English players have a proficient level of skill but how they choose to apply that skill compared to their European counterparts is vastly different. Over here it was traditionally stand in line and wait to do your skill and the go to the back of the line, wash rinse repeat. When you add it up you have the ball at your feet for a small amount of your training session.

On the continent it's all small sided games 2v2, 3v3, 4v4 from a very early age so the kids get exposed to passing, attacking, defending, running, dribbling and most importantly decision making.

I was getting my training session set up yesterday morning and I was watching one of our other teams games come to a close. The opposition coach was bellowing run run run, tackle tackle tackle, close down. The sad thing was that the kids were too scared to take risks in the game. How are they supposed to develop their skill and technique if the fear of failure is too high. What makes it worse is that you have seen successive Enlgland teams fail at major tournaments because of the ability to take calculated risks was coached out of them 20 years previous
 
Soldato
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Not really as there is nothing to argue about. A good/great/worldclass team is usually greater than the sum of it's individual parts. I wouldn't swap Rooney with anyone simply because what he does suits our style of play. Take Henry for example, he was on his last legs in his last season for Arsenal. Plays well for Barca and fits their style of play. Put him back in the prem and I doubt he would look any thing more than alright.

How can you not compare them though? You can compare then as a group as you say, in which it seems fairly clear Barca's is better. Regardless of whether Rooney would be better than Henry in Barca's team.
 
Soldato
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It wouldn't make them "better" it would at least give them a bigger chance, to play and improve.
How, exactly, would it do this?

If the cream of European football were restricted to their own national leagues, our English players would get to play them in the Champions League, yes, but currently, they play them every week, in the league.

As far as I'm aware, most of the lower Premiership sides are made up of English footballers. If they can't make it against Torres or Ronaldo currently, how would the new systems suddenly make them able to?


EDIT: Also, I think Henry would manage quite comfortably in the Prem again now. At the time, all the injuries had affected him, and it looked like he was going to lose all his pace. But that's not happened, and the Man Uts game proved he still has it against English sides.
 
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