English League & European Football [2nd Apr - 8th Apr 2010] **spoilers**
- Thread starter red11
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Well even if we don't use the word 'dominated' they've certainly done better than most in recent years (last 5 finals in a row, 3x semifinalist last 3 years). Officially they only won it twice during that time but don't forget Arsenal were robbed by an offside goal in 2006 so it could easily have been 3 times in 5 years.
If you look at the official UEFA rankings (it's not the official website, but I've been following it for many years and it is unerringly accurate) 4 of the top 5 teams in teams in Europe are English: http://www.xs4all.nl/~kassiesa/bert/uefa/data/method4/trank2010.html
Didn't Eboue dive for the free-kick which Arsenal scored from?
edit: and that UEFA rankings thing is as confusing as ****! How on earth can Barca only get 28.6 points from winning the CL but Shakhtar Donetsk get 29.3 points for winning the UEFA Cup?
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Didn't Eboue dive for the free-kick which Arsenal scored from?
Glass House
Gerrard - Dive AC Milan ring a bell
Oh and Yes Eboue dived, and Wenger pulled him up on it.
There have only being two English sides win the Champions league though, they can "dominate" as much as they want but football is about winning things and for European clubs thats the Champions League.
Arsenal and Chelsea haven't done it, United and Liverpool have just the once each. I wouldn't call that domination.
Caporegime
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Arsenal are 3rd in the league playing not bad football, but we played like Torquay last night, whats you point. THey weren't hitting you on the break AT ALL while Rafael was on the pitch, the passing was slow and pathetically bad and they didn't remotely wake up till gone 30 mins into the game.
Valencia wasnt' awesome, he was up against a truly awful left back, he was awful when Valencia was no where near him, he almost fell over the ball a few times just trying to run with it, I swear to christ that bloke isn't a footballer.
A bad footballer, is a bad footballer, he's awful, he's a DEFENDER, I've yet to see him have a good game defensively. HE decided to pick up a yellow because he was caught right up the field by kicking out petulantly after diving and not getting his own way. He then got a second yellow for being caught out of position one of the first times Ribery actually tried to run beyond a player.
THats all I've seen from all the games I've seen him play, he's consistantly always out of position and always making rash challenges to make up for it. He can't defend, he's a horrible defender, he won't ever be a good defender and that in my book makes him a bad right back. Personally I don't think he's shown to be good enough going forward, to make him a worthwhile addition to the team. IE if you're Cafu going forwards, it might not matter that you suck defensively. When you're not great going forwards and horrible defensively I really can't see the point.
I've already seen Rafael subbed on quite a few occasions to prevent him getting a second yellow, and he should have been tonight. For where Ribery was on the pitch, there was just no need to pull him back, it was petulance "he did me, I'll show him". Thats his entire attitude and you see it with every last decision in every game he plays.
Caporegime
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I wonder if DM still thinks Rooney should be playing on the wing
WHy don't you go back and READ what I said about ROoney, which has proved to be 100% correct.
While you lot all blathered on about his workrate, his tracking back and his never stopping. I was saying some very simple things, he's being played as both a striker and a midfielder, in tracking back he's not ever in the box and so not scoring. He's on the field as a striker, but he's trying to get on the ball and play in midfield, theres already 4(or 5) midfielders on he didn't need to be there.
I said they should play him as a STRIKER or a WINGER, but choose one role and make him stick to it. I said trying to play both positions in every game meant he was a master at neither and not really helping. LAst season due to having 2 other strikers and no wingers, try and follow the logic, he best served the TEAM by being the winger. You know what, when he was started as a winger for several games, and there were 2 strikers on the pitch, he was immense. He created goals, he wasn't caught in two roles, he had one and he excelled.
I didn't say he'd make a better winger than a striker, I said he had to do a SINGLE role. This year he's the striker, Utd bought a winger and Nani/Giggs have played, they don't have Tevez, no one likes Berbatov, this year he serves the TEAM better as a striker. But whats he doing as a striker compared to last year, he's NOT tracking back, he's always getting in the box, he's often the furthest up the field and he's excelled, playing a single role, and not trying to do everything all the time.
SO doing EXACTLY what I said, he's improved dramatically.
Last year based on having 4 fit players in Berb, Tevez, Ronaldo and Rooney, I said Rooney would be best picked as a winger, stick with one role and let him specialise. Who would you have picked out of those 4 to be the two wingers, let me guess, Ronaldo and Berbatov.
TEvez also this year doesn't track back anywhere near as much, he still runs around like a mad man, but he mostly restricts it to running around at the back 4, and constantly breaks his neck to get in the box, his strikerate much like Rooney's has gone through the roof, both playing as out and out strikers, and both have improved dramatically.
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that UEFA rankings thing is as confusing as ****! How on earth can Barca only get 28.6 points from winning the CL but Shakhtar Donetsk get 29.3 points for winning the UEFA Cup?
It's not the greatest system, we've discussed it in the past and I also believe it gives too much weighting to the UEFA Cup.
The reason Barca 'only' get 28.6pts for winning the CL is because the score isn't based just on how far you progress, but also on your results along the way (if you think about it, it would be fairly pointless if it was, because you could just look at where teams finished). So if we look at last season, Barcelona actually lost at home to Shaktar in the group stage, they also dropped points against the mightly Basel. They didn't win either of their semifinal matches against Chelsea either.
Meanwhile, Shaktar won home and away in CL qualifying, and then won 3 games in the champions league (including beating Barca at the Nou Camp) before they'd even gone into the UEFA Cup, that's 5 wins.
If you look at the games between Barca and Shaktar last season, had it been a knockout round, Shaktar would have knocked out Barca based on those two results.
Man of Honour
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Thread went mental..
The trouble is all it takes is one idiot and then any temporary support for another club goes out the window. Over most European threads here the so called patriotism about supporting another English club in Europe's completely disappeared. Look at the posts there are plenty of any fans of either four English sides in the Champion's League displaying joy that another's gone out. It's just how it is now, and of course there'll always be a bit of banter too.
I gotta admit that I took joy in United exiting, especially after some UTD supporters called it "justice" or "karma", that Cesc had been booked for a legit tackle in our first leg (thereby missing the second). Guess it's part of that banter.
It just seems odd. I expected it from the Scousers but I kinda guessed the Arsenal supporters would show a little more sympathy!
The trouble is all it takes is one idiot and then any temporary support for another club goes out the window. Over most European threads here the so called patriotism about supporting another English club in Europe's completely disappeared. Look at the posts there are plenty of any fans of either four English sides in the Champion's League displaying joy that another's gone out. It's just how it is now, and of course there'll always be a bit of banter too.
I gotta admit that I took joy in United exiting, especially after some UTD supporters called it "justice" or "karma", that Cesc had been booked for a legit tackle in our first leg (thereby missing the second). Guess it's part of that banter.
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Hope we do have a better refferee this time though! >.<
Soldato
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Caporegime
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your wrong he is good defensively and also good going forward.
but yes he does have a brazilian hot headed mentality.
i hope that he can learn from this.
Typical reaction from Ferguson, one of these days he'll lose gracefully.
Having seen the first yellow for that young fellow, I'm surprised he didn't get sent off - may not have been the worst challenge in the world, but many have been sent off for lesser cases of retaliation. Not sure about the second being a yellow, he did pull Ribery but looking at the replay the Frenchmans reaction was worse.
Great goal to win it though.
Having seen the first yellow for that young fellow, I'm surprised he didn't get sent off - may not have been the worst challenge in the world, but many have been sent off for lesser cases of retaliation. Not sure about the second being a yellow, he did pull Ribery but looking at the replay the Frenchmans reaction was worse.
Great goal to win it though.
Said this before Spawn hates anything to do with England and put England down when he can.
I'm not bitter at all, I pointed out that I was gutted that was all
You and most of the forum revel in MU's failures, you alway have. That is bitter.
I also see that personal attacks just get deleted now and the poster can continue to post
Whatever happened to the weeks ban for personal attacks eh?
Selective moderating again? I remember why I don't bother with this forum anymore.