The Official Football (Soccer) Thread (v. It's starting again!)

[John94]

Rafa would be a dangerous choice, I wouldn't like him to go to Chelsea because he would do a good job plus IF it didn't work out, I don't want to see a person I have so much respect for get treated like Abramovichs latest playtoy.

Mourinho won't go back.

For me, David Moyes deserves a top job at a club with money. He is a great manager, rivalry aside, he has done wonders on a tight budget at Everton.

[jag66]

Lolchelsea. You just can't buy the champions league.. or maybe you can you just need to spend like Man City.

Surely mourinho has too much pride to go back to chelsea and their let's face it ailing squad. I'd much rather see him at tottenham if harry takes the england job.

[emindead]

And he needs to get the fuck out of football, he is very talented but he is a disgrace, he is a cheater, he needs to go back to his country(Or any latin american league) so he can keep doing what he does best: cheating.

What the fuck is your problem?

What the fuck is yours?
I don't like cheaters and specially the ones like Suarez. He has the fucking ability to outplay a lot of people and there he goes and cheats and acts cowardly in almost every game he is in.
He sucks monkey dick.

"Or any Latin American League" was the part that bothered me.

[Nekov]

It's half time and Arsenal is beating Milan 3-0. Who would have thought?

[Zydar]

Yeah I'm watching that game now. It's really exciting!

[emindead]

I hope they don't screw it up!

[Zantera]

Too bad for Arsenal, Milan is such a lame team. The only good thing is that Milan will go out in the next round anyways.

[jag66]

I had a good feeling before the game, was expecting them to do it after being 3-0 up at half time. Don't care if Chelsea go through, but looks like there could be no english teams in the quarter finals, which is a shame for the competition imo.

[emindead]

Barcelona 2 - Bayern L. 0

Messi makes this look sooo easy.

[jag66]

Messi is truely a legend. He gets you 50 goals a season and countless assists i'm sure.

[emindead]

3-0 all by Messi.

[Nekov]

I intended to watch the match but I've been working a lot. And yes, Messi is a legend and I'm proud he was born in Argentina.

[emindead]

5-0; Messi four goals, Tello (in his international debut) one.

[Zantera]

Bayern Leverkusen isn't exactly the best team around, big shocker that Barcelona would win.

[jag66]

Bayern Leverkusen isn't exactly the best team around, big shocker that Barcelona would win.

Perhaps, but you can't argue with the football they play. Messi could be remembered at the end of his career as greater than even pele/maradona.

[toro]

And he needs to get the fuck out of football, he is very talented but he is a disgrace, he is a cheater, he needs to go back to his country(Or any latin american league) so he can keep doing what he does best: cheating.

What the fuck is your problem?

What the fuck is yours?
I don't like cheaters and specially the ones like Suarez. He has the fucking ability to outplay a lot of people and there he goes and cheats and acts cowardly in almost every game he is in.
He sucks monkey dick.

"Or any Latin American League" was the part that bothered me.

Don't worry bro, I'm Latin American(Mexico) and I know what I'm talking about. LA leagues are corrupted from the Top to the field. I would love to say this is not true but it sadly is, just look at La Copa Libertadores(I'm Looking at you Grondona)


Also Goddamn, Barcelona. It's not even fair anymore 

[Nekov]

Yeah, freaking Grondona needs to step down from everything football related. He destroyed Argentina's league already, it's awful to watch a match even when the best teams are playing and Copa Libertadores seems to be going the same route.

[Zantera]

Bayern Leverkusen isn't exactly the best team around, big shocker that Barcelona would win.

Perhaps, but you can't argue with the football they play. Messi could be remembered at the end of his career as greater than even pele/maradona.

Honestly I think he should be able to perform in Argentina if he should be anywhere close to being "the greatest" or whatever. Scoring 5 goals against teams like Leverkusen, Sporting Gijon & Villareal is one thing, but if you look at Pele and Maradona they did an amazing job playing for their countries as well, and Messi doesn't exactly have bad team mates in Argentina. Aguero, Higuain, Di Maria, Lavezzi. (the list goes on really)

[Nekov]

That is true but I'm not sure if you've seen any Argentina match lately. It's bascially the rest of the team giving the ball to Messi and then standing in the field waiting for him to work some magic. The other teams know that this happens so they get 2 or 3 players to match up with Messi making it impossible for him to do anything. I think Messi does a good job every time he plays in the national team, but this is a team sport and no matter how good a player is, the rest of the team still needs to do a good job too.

[Zantera]

Well, last time I saw Argentina was probably World Cup '10. But still. Of course it's a team sport, but Argentina is after all one of the big countries, and Messi has all the right conditions in order to reach success with them, though he hasn't yet. Obviously he's still young, and could reach success in the next world cup, or the one after that.
A personal favorite of mine, Ryan Giggs who I consider to be one of the best (not saying THE best) has the bad luck of coming from Wales. Sure, England hasn't had any success lately either, so it probably wouldn't have been a different situation if he had played there, but it's a shame that he never got to reach any success on the international-level, due to coming from Wales. Messi is pretty lucky in that sense, Argentina is a great football-country.

[Nekov]

I agree on almost everything you say there, Argentina has some great players but non of the last 4 managers we've had has been able to make the team work well. We are struggling in every match we play because the defense is not solid, the midfielders are not able to generate any danger to the opposing team and we rely on Messi, Higuain or Agüero to come up with all the goal situations. Messi has excellent players surrounding him but none of them is able to perform nearly as well as they do in their teams and that has an impact on Messi's game.

[jag66]

Bayern Leverkusen isn't exactly the best team around, big shocker that Barcelona would win.

Perhaps, but you can't argue with the football they play. Messi could be remembered at the end of his career as greater than even pele/maradona.

Honestly I think he should be able to perform in Argentina if he should be anywhere close to being "the greatest" or whatever. Scoring 5 goals against teams like Leverkusen, Sporting Gijon & Villareal is one thing, but if you look at Pele and Maradona they did an amazing job playing for their countries as well, and Messi doesn't exactly have bad team mates in Argentina. Aguero, Higuain, Di Maria, Lavezzi. (the list goes on really)

I do agree.. in order to be truely considered the best he probably needs to win a World Cup. Maradona pretty much dragged Argentina to victory in '86 or whenever it was, but Pele had an absolutely formidable team behind him. As you say, the Argentine players aren't exactly bad, but winning the World Cup is far less under an individual player's control, particularly when you have Spain at the other end of the pitch!

[emindead]

Football is a team game, but you need excellent individual players for the squad to become that good. Pelé's Santos and Brazil team had them; Maradona's Argentina had it as well (I'll give it to you the part that he basically, alone, gave Fiorentina's title). After '06, Argentina has had not a superb coach managing their squad. José Nestor Pekerman (Argentina's '06 coach resigned after Germany's cheating -you know, the penalties scandal -- he is now directing Colombia's national team, so I'm really, really excited about it; we beat Mexico 2-0 in that last friendly game) is an excellent coach, and the current one, Alejandro Sabella, is also really good.

Pekerman basically was the responsible to discover Messi. Many criticise him because he didn't let Messi play against Germany in 2006 (and they lost), the thing is that by then he was still too young. Messi's last game with Argentina was last week against Switzerland and he did a hat-trick. In sum, he has scored eight goals in two games. Not bad, not bad at all. I do believe Messi should play better in his national team, I'm sure that with Sabella he will.

[Zantera]

Messi is a great player no doubt. When people ask me who I think is best out of Ronaldo or Messi, I tend to say Ronaldo though. Sure I know Messi has great statistics in the El Classico-games, and I don't mean it as anything negative towards Messi, but in terms of being a more "allround" player, I think Ronaldo has that. I mean, he started out as a sort of Right Midfielder in Man United (in a 4-4-2 system), but eventually developed his offensive game loads, becoming more of a winger, and also a striker. I think Ronaldo has a few qualities that Messi doesn't have, like being pretty good on the head, great corners for example. Messi might be more technical, so this is just how I feel "overall".

Honestly I don't really like the term "best player", because it is impossible to judge such a thing. The general idea is that people go for offensive qualities such as goal-scoring, technical abilities, but Defensive ones are just as important in the sport.
Personally I prefer the term "Favorite"-player, because it's a subjective thing after all. And on that part I would say Özil, who scores goals, but also makes incredible assists. Seeing him in the World Cup '10 was amazing, and he did a big impact on me personally. I think he could take another step and become even more awesome, but he's one of the best playmakers already, and I'm still really bummed that Man U didn't buy him when they had the chance, he joined Madrid for like 8 million € or something, real bargain.

[emindead]

Last Clásico Özil was the man of the match, no doubt. He's a fantastic player.

[Zantera]

Bah. Bilbao deserved the win though, amazing game from them. Really interesting team overall, players like Muniain, Javi Martinez, Herrera and Llorente, some quality right there. Interesting game to watch, though a bit frustrating that Man United didn't do a better performance. I feel like they are starting to slack with their title-chances, while they are still in it for the Premier League-race, they have gone to hell in the League Cup, FA-Cup and Champions, if Man City ends up winning, that means a 0 titles-season for Man United, which is a bit surprising looking at the last couple of seasons.
Personally it wouldn't matter to me if Man U got demoted to Championship since I would still root for them (so no titles isn't that big of a problem for me), but I would love to see Man United play a more attractive football, something I doubt will happen under Ferguson. :/

[jag66]

I would love to see Man United play a more attractive football, something I doubt will happen under Ferguson. :/

He's been responsible for some pretty attractive football over the last 25 years i'd say! He's hardly a cautious manager.

Another good game. United didn't deserve to win although no doubt they'll be pissed as the second goal was marginally offside, and the third came from the (dubious?) freekick when evra lost his shoe. Really poor defending from rafael there though.

[Nekov]

I would love to see Man United play a more attractive football, something I doubt will happen under Ferguson. :/

He's been responsible for some pretty attractive football over the last 25 years i'd say! He's hardly a cautious manager.

I agree. I think what Manchester United needs is a renewal of players, bringing in mostly players that haven't won any titles yet and are eager to get a championship.

[Zantera]

I'm not saying that Man United are playing dull football, but I'm not the biggest fan of the 4-4-2 system. Personally I'm more into playing a 4-2-3-1 or 4-3-3 with a really good playmaker behind the striker, but Ferguson is more of a "attack on the sides"-kind of coach. Would love to see them go a bit more technical, but then they need to buy a few players who can handle that type of playing.
It will also be interesting to see who becomes the next manager for Man United, personally I think that either Giggs, Solskjær or Scholes would be interesting ideas, because they would have that Man United-status, and they know how the club works, so they could easily keep Ferguson's legacy going.

[emindead]

Bah. Bilbao deserved the win though, amazing game from them. Really interesting team overall, players like Muniain, Javi Martinez, Herrera and Llorente, some quality right there.

Oh, that's the signature of Marcelo Bielsa. Another excellent coach from Argentina.

[bugsyoz]

Reds.  Silverware.  Europe.

[Zantera]

Nice win for Arsenal. The win tonight, the one against Sunderland and the one against Liverpool have all been fantastic and important, three games that were all decided in additional time, and it's that kind of flow or "luck" that signifies a top team. You can chase that late goal all you want, but scoring it... that's a quality that most top teams have.

Must feel really sucky to be a Spurs-supporter now, it looked good a while ago, but there's really nothing that speaks for a Champions League spot anymore, next up Spurs have a tough game away against Chelsea, a team that is really hungry and needs to win. Chelsea will win it, because Spurs have been horrible against good teams this season. A lot of speculations about how Spurs would become a top team, and that they would sign Hazard and so on, but now it looks like the only thing they'll be celebrating is a spot in Europa League.
Van Der Vaart said that the difference between Tottenham and Real Madrid was that in Madrid, there were 2 hour long tactics before the game, and in Spurs there's Redknapp saying "go out there and earn the fans love". This says quite a lot, and I don't think Spurs will win anything under Redknapp. He's a solid coach, but not a big tactician, and I don't get why everyone wants to see him as the coach for England, they could do better.

Top4 how it will end:
1. Man U
2. Man C
3. Arsenal
4. Chelsea

[ariich]

I'll be perfectly content with top 4, but if we can pip Spurs to 3rd, that would be great, and if they drop out of the top 4, even better!

[Neon]

I don't really follow soccer outside of MLS, and now that the season is here it's time for me to return to my regularly scheduled alcoholism.   

And I will say this:  If last night's game is indicative of how this season is going to go for the Union, I'm going to be drinking even more heavily than normal.  Ugh what a terrible, terrible game. 

[emindead]

Athletic Club Bilbao eliminated Manchester United. Man U is in a downhill spiral.

This also shows how incredible Marcelo Bielsa is as a coach.